COURT NEWS UPDATE

By DEBRA HAIGHT
BCR Correspondent
ST. JOSEPH – A Berrien Springs woman is headed to prison after being sentenced for hiring a hit man to kill her ex-husband’s new girlfriend. Meanwhile, the case against a Niles man who shot a Michigan State Police Trooper last fall is progressing.
Kalamazoo County Circuit Judge Pamela Lightvoet presided over the early December trial of Alana Gonzalez and handed down a sentence of 10 years to 40 years in prison last week. Berrien County Assistant Prosecutor Kate Arnold

said Judge Lightvoet handed down a sentence which was at the middle to high end of the guideline range.
Gonzalez, 59, of Berrien Springs, was convicted of hiring Benton Harbor resident Quacy Roberts to kill Bonita Levi in March, 2020. Levi was dating Elvin Gonzalez, Alana’s ex-husband, at the time and is now married to him. Alana Gonzalez has been divorced from Elvin Gonzalez since early 2017.
Elvin Gonzalez is the Berrien County Trial Court Family Division Administrator, a fact that led all Berrien County Trial Court judges to recuse themselves and Judge Lightvoet to handle the case.
Arnold reported that those speaking before the sentencing were herself, Gonzalez, Gonzalez’s attorney Jessica LaFond and the victim, Bonita Levi Gonzalez. LaFond and Alana Gonzalez both asked for leniency and cited Gonzalez’s lack of criminal record.
For her part, Bonita Gonzalez spoke about how the incident had affected her life and the lives of her children. She said after the sentencing that she was satisfied with the sentence handed down but was saddened that Alana Gonzalez never asked forgiveness nor ever say she was sorry for the impact her actions had on others.
“As the victim in this case I want to state how the defendant’s decisions and words have impacted my life,” she said. “I do not understand how the defendant being a mother and claiming to love and want to help her son, could want to take the life of another mother. My children would have had to live the rest of their lives without their mother.”
“… I have never met or spoken to her,” Bonita Gonzalez said. “I did nothing to justify her hatred and cruelty. Throughout her text messages shown during the trial and in her own words when she was on the stand, she stated that if Quacy Roberts was not going to do the project she wanted her money back and that she would find someone else to do it.”
“She admitted on the stand that she knew from the beginning they were doing something very wrong, but yet she continued with her actions and plotting to have me killed; even the morning of the day that she was arrested,” she added.
“Throughout the trial the defendant never showed or has since shown remorse or attempted to ask forgiveness from me, her children, Elvin and many others impacted by her words and actions,” Bonita Gonzalez told the judge.
“… Being a Christian, I have been and will continue to pray for her,” she added. “I know God would never want someone to harm, scare or kill another person. Ultimately as this nightmare concludes, I want two things: Truth and Justice. The Trial revealed the Truth. Now you get to dispense Justice”
“For the safety of myself and others and to demonstrate that choices have consequences, I am asking that she be given at the very least the maximum sentence.”
Judge Lightvoet told Alana Gonzalez that she was not the victim and didn’t have the right to control other people. “As I sat through your trial I thought, ‘Why?’ This is unbelievable behavior, conspiring to kill somebody, and I think you still don’t get that,” the judge told the defendant.
“You are not the victim in this case. You have caused everyone in this courtroom to be a victim, probably most of all your mother and your children, and of course Bonita. People can’t go around and just off someone because they’re dating their ex-husband … That is evil in itself.”

In the case involving the shooting of a Michigan State Police Trooper, Isaac Ntabaazi faces a March 14 trial in Berrien County Trial Court before Judge Sterling Schrock. A status conference in the case is set for Feb. 28.
Ntabaazi, 24, of Niles, is charged with multiple felonies including assault with intent to murder, possession of a firearm by a felon, carrying a concealed weapon, altering a weapon, resisting and obstructing police causing serious injury and four counts of use of a firearm in the commission of a felony.
The incident occurred Oct. 6 when the car Ntabaazi was a passenger in was stopped by police at the intersection of Ninth and Main Streets in Niles. When Trooper Jason Devries asked Ntabaazi to step out of the car, the two struggled and Ntabaazi allegedly shot the trooper in the leg. Devries returned gunfire and hit him in the head. Both men have since recovered.
Assistant Prosecutor Jerry Vigansky and defense attorney Scott Sanford appeared before Judge Schrock last week for a case conference for Ntabaazi who also faces a felony charge of delivery/manufacture of meth from a separate March, 2020 incident. Ntabaazi remains in the Berrien County Jail.
Sanford told Judge Schrock that he’s doubtful the trial can start on March 14 as there are tests he wants to have conducted on the weapons involved in the incident and the clothing the defendant wore.
Judge Schrock said he planned to keep the case on the current schedule for the time being. He said he would address the issues again at the Feb. 28 status conference.