JAMAICAN, Aristotle Marr pleaded guilty in a Seattle court on Friday to six felony charges arising from a bank robbery, but his family still maintains that the 26 year-old former straight-A student is being punished for crimes he did not commit.

Marr accepted a plea bargain that will reduce a possible 40-year sentence to between 17 and 23 years. He is to be sentenced on April 19.

Marr handed himself in last year after being on the run for six months. Seattle police believed that he was at the time hiding in Jamaica.

He is accused of robbing a Seattle bank along with an accomplice, Daniel del Fierro, who was killed in an ensuing gun battle with Seattle police. A police officer was shot and injured in the incident. Marr gave a written statement admitting that he was one of two robbers who held up a Wells Fargo branch on June 22, 2000. His accomplice fired at the police in the parking lot and was killed. Marr ran, tried to carjack a passer-by, then held hostage an elderly couple as he arranged a ride from their home.

But Marr’s brother, Lorenzo, said Marr pleaded guilty only because he was “caught between a rock and a hard place”.

“We haven’t been treated fairly by the media, the officers or the court,” said the 28 year-old Lorenzo Marr, who is himself in trouble with the law. He was convicted last year of witness intimidation and possessing stolen property, and is now awaiting appeal of the conviction.

Marr’s sister, Loraine, 30, accused police detectives of tampering with DNA evidence to show that Marr’s blood was found at the crime scene.

Last year Marr fired two court-appointed lawyers, hired a private attorney and then attempted to post US$500,000 bail with money he claimed came from a wealthy Jamaican businessman, Noel McLean. However, investigations by Seattle and local police could not prove the existence of McLean and prosecutors accused Marr of using his own ill-gotten wealth to post the bail. After the judge insisted that McLean should come to court to prove his existence, Marr’s family said McLean withdrew his offer, not wanting the publicity which it would bring.