LIMA — Two of four young Lima residents charged in an organized scheme to concoct and carry out a robbery at a Brower Road apartment complex last fall were sentenced in Allen County Common Pleas Court Thursday.
Cardale Funches was sentenced Thursday to 3 to 4 1/2 years in prison, while Breanna Cochran got probation for her role in the incident.
Funches, 23, in June accepted an offer from prosecutors and pleaded guilty to an amended second-degree felony count of robbery. In exchange for that plea, the state removed language in the indictment alleging that Funches used a firearm in the commission of the crime and the felony was reduced from a first-degree felony.
Prior to his sentencing on Thursday, Funches apologized to the victim and said the incident “wasn’t supposed to happen the way it did.” He said he were there merely to “help someone get their stuff back.”
Allen County Common Pleas Court Judge Terri Kohlrieser, however, cited discrepancies between the details of the robbery as described by Funches in his pre-sentence report and the statements he gave police following the incident. An interview with police apparently showed that Funches admitted he had an active role in planning and carrying out the robbery.
Cochran, 20, appeared in court that afternoon and pleaded guilty to a Bill of Information charging her with robbery, a felony of the third degree. She had been charged by a grand jury with a first-degree felony count of armed robbery with a firearm specification.
After accepting the deal from prosecutors, Cochran was sentenced by Judge Terri Kohlrieser to two years on Community Control (probation) with the stipulation that the maximum prison exposure Cochran faces for any infractions while on probation would be capped at 18 months.
Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Kenneth Sturgill said Cochran was “by far the least culpable” of the four defendants and “cooperated fully” with law enforcement throughout the investigation.
Sobbing openly in court, Cochran apologized to the victim.
“I was hanging out with the wrong people. I was raised better than that,” she told the judge.
Funches and Cochran, along with Jordyn Mitchell and Isahia Dyous, conspired to rob Tyshawn Thompson outside the Maplewood/Northwood Apartments on Brower Road in Lima last September. Thompson told police he had been kicked out of his apartment by Mitchell and their roommate, Cochran, and was to meet with Mitchell outside the apartment complex to exchange some personal property.
Thompson told police that during that meeting, two black males approached the group. One of the men, later identified as Funches, reportedly pulled a handgun from his sweatshirt and pointed it at Thompson before robbing him of his cellphone and identification. The other black male was later identified as Dyous.
Mitchell was sentenced in April to three years in prison on a second-degree felony charge of robbery. Dyous pleaded guilty to an amended second-degree felony count of robbery and will be sentenced Aug. 27.
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