LOCAL TRIAL AND CIRCUIT COURTS GIVE PRISON, JAIL AND PROBATION SENTENCES

NILES – Recent action in Berrien County Trial Court and Cass County Circuit Court resulted in prison, jail and probation terms for several area residents.
Simeon Lee Fox, 55, of Ferry Street in Niles, pleaded no contest to attempted assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than murder and was sentenced Monday in Berrien County Trial Court to 38 months to five years in prison. He has credit for 105 days already served.
Fox must pay $1,598 in fines and costs and $550.97 in restitution. He also faces sentencing for use of cocaine next week before Berrien County Trial Judge Charles LaSata in St. Joseph.
This incident occurred March 5 in the Niles Rite Aid parking lot on South 11th Street when Fox got into a fight with his ex-girlfriend and her new boyfriend and cut both of them with a box cutter.
Berrien County Trial Judge Angela Pasula said Fox had one of the lengthiest criminal records she has ever seen. She noted that he has been to jail 26 times and to prison twice. He has five prior assault convictions. He has 34 prior misdemeanor and five prior felony convictions.
“You were upset with your ex-girlfriend and her friend,” she said. “You were arguing, you were angry upset and you chose to fight. You sliced both of them. He’s lucky that you didn’t slice him through the eyeball. He has a cut from his forehead to his cheek and needed 20 stitches. He will forever wear the scars of your violence on his face.”
Fox acknowledged that he made a bad judgment and was sorry, but maintained that he was acting in self-defense.
In another prison sentence, a Sawyer man was sentenced for molesting two young girls in Galien.
Tyrel Robert Cummings, 35, of Flynn Road in Sawyer, pleaded guilty to assault with intent to commit sexual penetration and was sentenced Monday in Berrien County Trial Court to 48 months to 10 years in prison.
The incident occurred over a period of several years at a Galien area home. The victims are both under age 12.
Cummings had originally been charged with three counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct against victims under age 13. He was charged as a habitual offender.
In other sentencings, a Niles area teen was sentenced to probation for shooting his uncle in an April incident in Milton Township.
Dakota Stanley, 17, of Kline Road in Milton Township near Niles, pleaded no contest to careless use of a firearm causing injury or death in May and was sentenced Friday in Cass Circuit Court to two years probation and $1,498 in fines and costs. He was given credit for 30 days in jail already served. Restitution, if any, will be determined at a later date.
The incident occurred April 16 at Stanley’s home on Kline Road. The shooting occurred when the teen intervened in an argument between his aunt and uncle, Carolyn and Thomas Lewallen. Thomas Lewallen, 33 and a St. Joseph resident, was shot in the neck.
Stanley had originally faced six felony charges: assault with intent to murder, assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than murder, assault with a dangerous weapon and three counts of felony firearm.
“This was two to three inches away from a homicide,” Cass County Proseuctor Victor Fitz said. “If his (Stanley’s) aim was slightly different, the victim easily could be dead … He received the benefit of a plea deal, but it was a serious matter. Someone could have died. You don’t bring a gun to a fistfight or when people are pushing each other.”
“You’re a very lucky young man that this didn’t escalate into something far worse,” Cass Circuit Judge Mark Herman said. “The next time you see something getting out of control, call the police.”
A Dowagiac man with a long criminal record was sentenced to a year in the county jail.
Annise Lamont Nickens, 43, of Michigan 51 North in Dowagiac, pleaded guilty to tampering with an electronic monitoring device as a habitual offender and was sentenced to 365 days in jail and $1,548 in fines and costs. He was also ordered to pay $1,075 in restitution for the cost of the device unless it is found and returned.
He was sentenced to a concurrent 365 days in jail and ordered to pay $50 for attempted resisting and obstructing police.
Nickens has credit for no days served although he’s been in jail since late December because he was on parole from 2011 sentences for home invasion, larceny in a building and resisting and obstructing police.
The electronic monitoring device incident occurred Dec. 28 at a location in Cassopolis when he cut off his alcohol monitoring device. The other offense occurred Sept. 12.
“At age 43, he has had a troubling past with 12 felony and four misdemeanor convictions as an adult,” Cass County Prosecutor Victor Fitz said. “What he did was an affront to public safety. Cutting off the bracelet is no small matter. The public needs to be protected.”