Court Digest

New York
Former county DA, aide set for sentencing in beating case
CENTRAL ISLIP, N.Y. (AP) — A former Long Island prosecutor and one of his top aides convicted of helping cover up the beating of a suspect are facing sentencing this week.

Former Suffolk County District Attorney Thomas Spota and Christopher McPartland were convicted in December 2019 on counts of conspiracy, obstruction of justice, witness tampering and civil rights violations.

They were accused of helping cover for a police chief who punched a handcuffed man suspected of stealing sex toys and pornography from the chief’s department SUV.

The police chief, James Burke, has already pleaded guilty and received a 46-month sentence.

Sentencing for Spota and McPartland sentencing is scheduled for Tuesday morning. A federal judge said last week that the men are looking at prison sentences of between 57 months and 71 months, Newsday reported. Prosecutors have sought 96-month sentences.

Defense attorneys have argued for lower sentences, claiming it was Burke who orchestrated the coverup.

Iowa
Waterloo man sentenced to prison over ‘Wild West’ shootout
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (AP) — A 47-year-old Waterloo man has been sentenced to more than seven years in federal prison over a shootout in the parking lot of a liquor store that the judge called “not unlike the Wild West.”

U.S. District Judge C.J. Williams in Cedar Rapids imposed the sentence this week on Charles Antony Ware for being a felon illegally in possession of a firearm. Ware pleaded guilty to the charge in March.

The Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier reports that Williams also described Ware’s criminal history as “fairly nonstop,” with 30 convictions, six convictions for violent assaults on women and violent misconduct during past prison terms.

The shootout in the Waterloo liquor store’s parking lot was in September 2020. Police said Ware and 34-year-old Demitrius Shambray Cannon, also from Waterloo, argued and then exchanged gunfire.

Court records say that Cannon was struck in the ankle and stay bullets took out nearby windows.

Ware drove off, and Cannon was found crawling in the street. Court records accuse him of tossing a pistol as a police officer approached.

Cannon also was barred from handling guns because of a previous felony conviction, and he pleaded guilty in April to an illegal gun possession charge. His sentencing is set for September.

Indiana
County settles with wrongfully jailed ex-inmate
SOUTH BEND, Ind. (AP) — A northern Indiana county has reached a financial settlement with a former inmate who was wrongfully jailed for more than 40 days after being charged in two counties for the same offense.

St. Joseph County’s commissioners recently approved a $12,500 settlement for Ian McQueen, 42, who was charged in both St. Joseph and Elkhart counties with stealing a car. He was kept in the St. Joseph County Jail for 43 days despite being sentenced to probation in Elkhart County for the same crime.

Officials blamed a lack of communication between the two counties’ court systems for the situation.

Court documents show McQueen stole a car in Mishawaka but was arrested for that offense by police in Elkhart. Two separate sets of charges were then filed in Elkhart and St. Joseph counties for the same offense, the South Bend Tribune reported.

McQueen pleaded guilty in the Elkhart case and was sentenced to probation in November 2020. However, because a warrant was issued for his arrest in the pending St. Joseph County case, police there were required to hold him in jail, said Pete Agostino, an attorney who represented the county commissioners in the settlement.

“This was not a sheriff issue or a jail issue,” he said. “There were a number of innocent factors that came together to produce something that should not have happened, frankly.”

St. Joseph County also settled a case in June in which a man was kept in jail 60 days past his sentence due to a “software glitch.” That man received $20,000 from county. Officials said McQueen’s case was unrelated to that glitch.


Mississippi
Order: Judges have discretion for COVID safety
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Mississippi judges have the power to delay trials, limit the number of spectators in courtrooms or take other steps to try to slow the spread of COVID-19, the leader of the state Supreme Court says in an emergency order.

Chief Justice Michael Randolph issued the order  Thursday in response to the rapid spread of illness caused by highly contagious delta variant of the virus.

Mississippi has one of the lowest COVID-19 vaccination rates in the nation, and the state health officer, Dr. Thomas Dobbs, said Friday that 97% of new cases of COVID-19 in Mississippi are among people who are unvaccinated.

Randolph’s order said judges may postpone jury trials that are scheduled through Sept. 10. In addition to limiting the number of spectators in courtrooms, judges may require people to wear masks and maintain distance between each other. The order encouraged courts to use teleconferencing and videoconferencing, when possible.

Plea hearings in felony cases must still take place in person, but defendants and others in the courtrooms should wear masks and maintain social distancing.

“Any in-person proceedings shall be limited to attorneys, parties, witnesses, security officers, members of the press and other necessary persons, as determined by the trial judge,” Randolph wrote.

South Carolina
Priest on leave after lawsuit over sexual relationship
GREENVILLE, S.C. (AP) — A Catholic priest in South Carolina has been placed on leave after he was sued by a woman who said the pastor manipulated her into a sexual relationship.

Father Wilbroad Mwape was removed at least temporarily as the pastor at St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church in Greenville by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Charleston, The Greenville News reported.

Diocese spokesperson Maria Aselage said the church is reviewing the lawsuit and will respond later.

Both Mwape and the diocese are named in the lawsuit, filed in Orangeburg County.

Before coming to Greenville in 2020, Mwape was pastor at Holy Trinity Church in Orangeburg. It was there that the woman said Mwape started grooming her into a sexual relationship, growing her knowledge in the Catholic faith while also using her confessions about trouble in her marriage to prey on her vulnerabilities, according to her lawsuit.

The relationship between the two grew more physically intimate until she spent the night in the church’s rectory and they had sex, according to the lawsuit.

Mwape would later use hotel rooms paid for using a credit card from the Diocese of Charleston to continue the relationship, the woman said.

The lawsuit said Mwape’s behavior was covered up by the diocese and reflects a pattern of abuse in other Catholic churches.

Neither Mwape or the woman and her lawyer responded to messages from the newspaper.

Mwape has been a priest for 25 years. Around 2000, he took classes for hospital chaplains in Charleston, then returned to Zambia, was he was born. Mwape returned to the Charleston Diocese in 2015, the newspaper reported.


Missouri
Man sentenced to life plus 100 years for stabbing
SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (AP) — A 33-year-old Springfield man has been sentenced to life in prison without parole plus 100 years over the December 2019 fatal stabbing of a 19-year-old woman in an isolated field.

Missouri law required the sentence of life without parole after a jury in May found Lonnie Williams guilty of first-degree murder. But the jury also convicted him of armed criminal action.

During Friday’s sentencing, Greene County Circuit Judge Becky Borthwick added the additional 100 years for the armed criminal action after hearing a statement from victim Mackenna Milhon’s mother, The Springfield News-Leader reported. She described her pain in seeing her daughter’s life cut short.

Prosecutors said Williams took Milhon to a secluded area north of Springfield and stabbed her more than a dozen times. Her body was found 10 days after she went missing.

Prosecutors also said the evidence indicated that Milhon tried to run away from Williams but he tracked her down and stabbed her to death, with part of the attack occurring when she was on the ground.

Wisconsin
Former judge to plead guilty to child porn charges
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A former juvenile court judge in Wisconsin has reached a deal with prosecutors to resolve a host of child pornography charges filed against him earlier this year.

Court records show that former Milwaukee County Children’s Court Judge Brett Blomme agreed to plead guilty to two counts of distributing child pornography in federal court in Madison,  the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported  Friday. Each count carries a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in prison.

The deal would resolve seven child pornography counts against him in state court. Each of those counts carries a maximum 25-year prison sentence.

According to a criminal complaint, the state Department of Justice began investigating Blomme in February after receiving a tip from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children that he had uploaded child pornography through the Kik messaging application 27 times in October and November.

He was charged in state court in Dane County in March. A federal grand jury indicted him in May.

The state Supreme Court barred Blomme from serving as a judge after he was charged in state court.

Blomme’s attorney, Chris Van Wagner, said he’s trying to schedule a date in September for Blomme to enter his pleas.

“He’s ashamed and embarrassed,” Van Wagner told The Associated Press by phone. “He wants people to forgive him, which isn’t easy. He just asks that people remember that nobody is as bad as their worst decision or as good as their greatest victory.”

New Mexico
Ex-mayor convicted in corruption case ordered to apologize
LAS VEGAS, N.M. (AP) — A former northern New Mexico mayor has been ordered to apologize to Las Vegas city officials and contractors as part of her sentence in a corruption case.

District Judge Abigail Aragon on Friday ordered ex-Mayor Tonita Gurule-Giron to publicly apologize and write letters of apology to city employees and contractors impacted by her interfering in city contracts to benefit her boyfriend.

Aragon also sentenced Gurule-Giron to 18 months probation and ordered her to complete 40 hours of community service and pay $1,000 in restitution.

A jury in May convicted Gurole-Giron of two felony charges — violation of ethical principles of service and soliciting or receiving illegal kickbacks.

However, Aragon ruled that the two charges were too similar and constituted double jeopardy, so she sentenced Gurule-Giron on only one of them.

Attorney General Hector Balderas told the Las Vegas Optic  that he was disappointed that Gurule-Giron received a probation term instead of the three-year prison sentence sought by prosecutors.

Gurole-Giron’s defense requested six months probation and no restitution, citing her lack of criminal history and non-violent offense.

Gurule-Giron served as Las Vegas’ mayor from 2016 until her resignation in January 2020, after charges were filed in December 2019 following lengthy investigation by the Attorney General’s Office.


South Dakota
Porcupine man sentenced to 20 years for molesting 2 girls
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) — A 73-year-old South Dakota man has been sentenced to 20 years in federal prison for sexually molesting two young girls five years ago.

Leonard Brings Plenty, of Porcupine, pleaded guilty in December 2020 to abusive sexual contact. He was accused of molesting a 4-year-old girl and 6-year-old girl in 2016 at his residence on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.

U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Viken also ordered Brings Plenty to serve five years of supervised released.

The case was investigated by the FBI.