Man serving jail term for Florida stabbings gets another 60 years for stabbing his cellmate
Justin V. Noelker, sentenced in 2016 to serve eight years for stabbing two people in Florida, was due to be released from the Santa Rosa (Fla.) Correctional Institution in March 2025, according to the Florida Department of Corrections.
His release date has changed. After Noelker was found guilty Wednesday of stabbing his cellmate in November 2021, he has now been sentenced to an additional 60 years, making his release date sometime in 2085.
According to WEAR in Pensacola, Noelker was charged in with aggravated battery by a person detained in prison and two counts of possession of a weapon in a correctional institution after he stabbed his cellmate multiple times with “homemade weapons.”
After a Santa Rosa County jury found him guilty Wednesday, Circuit Court Judge Clifton Drake sentenced Noelker to the additional 60 years under Florida Prison Releasee Reoffender guidelines, based on his criminal history, according to the report.
Noelker’s original release date was set for March 2023, but was later changed to March 2025. FDOC records do not indicate why or when the additional two years were added.
The 32-year-old Noelker had just arrived in Brevard County, Fla., from his native Indiana in March 2015 when he was arrested and charged with stabbing a 61-year-old man and his 24-year-old daughter at their condominium in Cocoa Beach, according to a report on the incident by WESH.
In Wayne County, Ind., Noelker, who prosecutors there described as a “lifelong criminal,” was also found guilty in August 2019 of assaulting a man and stealing his car. He was sentenced to 15 years, plus another 15 as a habitual offender, according to the Richmond (Ind.) Palladium-Item.
The judge in that case ruled Noelker would serve that sentence consecutively — after his Florida sentence was completed — but with the additional 60 years tacked on for the prison stabbing, it appears Noelker will remain incarcerated in Florida.