BERRIEN COUNTY TRIAL COURT NEWS

A Berrien Springs man is going to jail after being caught trying to get a Florida girl to send him nude pictures. Meanwhile, a Vandalia man who stabbed someone at a downtown Dowagiac bar is going to prison.
Matt Clellan Avery, 49, of North Kimmel Street in Berrien Springs pleaded guilty to accosting a child for immoral purposes and was sentenced Monday in Berrien County Trial Court to five years probation, 120 days in jail and $2,558 in fines and costs. He has credit for three days already served.
Avery must register as a sex offender and was ordered to not have a social media profile and not own a computer or tablet able to connect to the internet, any photographic equipment and children’s toys. He cannot have electronic or physical contact with anyone 17 years old or younger.
The incident occurred Aug. 23 after Avery had established a Facebook relationship with a nine year old girl in Florida, asking her to send nude photos of herself and also engaging in sexually explicit conversations. The girl’s mother discovered Avery’s posts and contacted police who posed as the girl in continuing online interactions with Avery.
“Saying I’m sorry doesn’t seem like enough,” Avery told Berrien County Trial Judge Angela Pasula. “I am truly very remorseful … After my divorce, I spiraled into depression and was very lonely. This is something I will always regret.”
Avery said he has the support of his family and pastor and is going to counseling. “I’m anxious to get my life started over again,” he said.
“This is obviously a very disturbing incident,” Judge Pasula said. “The internet can be used for good or evil. Although the final acts you did were actually to a police officer and not to the nine year old, it will have an effect on her. She was very vulnerable and naive and you asked for pornographic pictures and phone sex.”
“I’m at a little bit of a loss as to where this came from,” she added. “It tells me that something pretty significant is going on and that you need to be monitored.”
Meanwhile, Donte Dera Lofton, 29, of Union Road in Vandalia, pleaded guilty to assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than murder as a habitual offender and was sentenced Friday in Cass Circuit Court to three years to 20 years in prison. He must pay $198 in fines and costs and has credit for 322 days already served.
The incident occurred April 23, 2016 at the Beeson Street Bar. Lofton was one of several people involved in a fight at the bar and ended up stabbing Patrick Eichel twice in the chest and abdomen with a box cutter.
Eichel spoke before the sentencing and said he could have been killed. “He had every intent to kill me,” he said. “I was stabbed in the heart.”
“This was an extremely dangerous situation for the victim and the other people in the tavern,” Cass Prosecutor Victor Fitz said. “The defendant has a lust for trouble and here a lust for violence. Somebody could have been killed. He committed the crime and then lied about it. I think it’s extremely unfortunate that he’s still playing himself as the victim.”
“In this case, he didn’t act like a man but a thug. He came a couple of inches from killing someone. He could have simply left, but he cut the victim two times, once in the heart and once in other vital organs … I ask for 10 to 20 years in prison, he is a danger to our public.”
Defense attorney Robert Drake painted a different view of Lofton. He noted that besides one conviction for assault and battery, Lofton’s other convictions were not assault related. “This incident happened as the result of a bar fight involving four to eight people,” he said. “Mr. Eichel initiated the incident by grabbing the defendant.”
“This situation shouldn’t have happened, it was a total misunderstanding,” Lofton said. “I apologized for what happened. It was a bar fight, everyone was intoxicated. I was not violent, I was just protecting myself. I wish it had nevery happened.”
“Everyone in the courtroom knows that bars and weapons don’t go together,” Cass Circuit Judge Mark Herman said. “If you wanted something different to happen, you would not bring a weapon.”