LOCAL COURTS ARRAIGN TWO MEN ON MURDER CHARGES; SENTENCE OTHERS FOR MURDER, ROBBERY AND SEXUAL ASSAULT

Recent court action in Berrien and Cass Counties include arraignments of murder suspects and prison sentencings.
The Niles man who claimed early last week that two men had broken into his Niles Township home and killed his wife was arrested for her murder by the middle of the week. An autopsy showed that Carla Lewis, 55, had been shot five times including once in the head.
John Benton Lewis, 49, had been arrested shortly after the Aug. 13 homicide at a home in the 1400 block of Lawndale for being out of compliance with the state Medical Marijuana Act. By last Wednesday, he had also been arraigned on a charge of premeditated first degree murder.
The murder charge was authorized against Lewis after an investigation including the results of the forensic examination of the crime scene, the autopsy and witness interviews. Lewis reportedly had previously plotted to kill his wife and told others of his plans.
At the end of last week, the vehicle Lewis had reported stolen from their residence had been located in a corn field near Niles in Howard Township.
Lewis remains in jail in lieu of $1 million bond on the murder charge and $7,000 on the marijuana charge. He was expected to be in court this week for a pre-exam conference on both charges and Aug. 29 for preliminary hearings.
A Georgia man has been arraigned on an open murder charge in connection with the shooting death of a Benton Harbor man last week. Davion Turner, 19, of Conyers, Georgia was charged with open murder and use of a firearm in the commission of a felony ln the shooting death of Nathaniel Lee, 32, of Benton Harbor.
The incident occurred at 11:45 p.m. Aug. 15 at the River Terrace housing complex in Benton Harbor. Lee was sitting in a parked vehicle with another person when he was allegedly shot twice by Turner in what may have been a robbery. Turner was believed to have been in Benton Harbor visiting his father.
He remains in jail on $1 million bond with GPS monitoring if he gets out of jail. His pre-exam conference is set for Aug. 25 and his preliminary hearing for Aug. 31.
Open murder includes options for first and second degree murder with the first carrying a mandatory prison term of life without parole and the second carrying a maximum penalty of life or any term of years in prison.
In sentencings, a Benton Harbor man was sentenced to life in prison without parole in Berrien County Trial Court although he unsuccessfully tried to withdraw his guilty plea.
Anthony Sanders, 21, of Benton Harbor, had pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree felony murder in the middle of his July trial in Berrien County Trial Court. He admitted killing Kenneth Martin last November during a robbery attempt on East Empire Avenue in Benton Township.
Last week, Berrien County Trial Judge Arthur Cotter sentenced Sanders to life in prison without the possibility for parole which is the mandatory sentence for a first degree murder conviction.
A Coloma man is going to spend the next several years in prison for a 2016 armed robbery of a Dowagiac gas station. Christopher Baptiste Rhodes committed the robbery just three months after he had gotten out of prison from a 2005 armed robbery conviction.
Rhodes, 31, of East Becht Road in Coloma, was sentenced Friday in Cass County Circuit Court after pleading guilty in March to two counts of armed robbery, one count of possession of a firearm by a felon and one count of larceny in a building.
Cass Circuit Judge Mark Herman sentenced Rhodes to two concurrent terms of 13 to 50 years in prison on the armed robbery counts, a concurrent term of two to five years in prison for possession of a firearm by a felon and a concurrent term of two to four years in prison for larceny in a building.
Rhodes has credit for no days already served since he was on parole when the incident occurred. The sentences he received Friday will be consecutive to any prison term he gets for violating his parole. The 2005 conviction was for robbing a liquor store in Dowagiac.
The most recent armed robbery took place nearly a year ago on Aug. 29, 2016 at the All Star Marathon gas station on Spruce Street in Dowagiac. Rhodes entered the gas station wearing a black covering over his face and armed with a gun. He robbed the store employee as well as took the wallet of a customer, getting away with less than $1,000.
A Dowagiac man who lured a woman to a vacant home to rape her will spend the next two years in prison.
Willie Lee Davis, 27, of East Railroad Street in Dowagiac, pleaded guilty to second-degree assault with intent to commit criminal sexual conduct and was sentenced Friday in Cass Circuit Court to a prison term of two to five years.
He has credit for 156 days already served and must pay $1,048 in fines and costs. He must register as a sex offender.
The incident occurred Sept. 25, 2015 at a home on Courtland Street in Dowagiac. The victim left the Dowagiac VFW with Davis and another man. The men took her to the Courtland Street home where she was raped and her purse was taken. Davis was identified later by his DNA.