LIMA — A convicted felon received a lecture from a judge Monday about young criminals with guns before receiving nine years prison.
Judge Jeffrey Reed told 20-year-old Donovan Peoples that young people, such as himself, need to stop carry guns illegally and using them to solve trivial problems. The judge asked Peoples when it would end? Reed said he feared only when all the people who commit such crimes are dead.
“You are screwing up your own life. You are screwing up the lives of the people who are victims,” Reed said. “This could have been a murder.”
Peoples stood and listened but had little to say, other than he was sorry for shooting a gun inside the G-Spot Bar at 126 E. North St., on March 28, 2016. Joshua Jamison and two women were struck by th gunfire. All lived.
The shooting happened after Jamison allegedly bumped into Peoples’ friend, Cameron Lott. Lott addressed Jamison and Peoples pulled out a gun and fired inside a crowded bar, a prosecutor said.
Peoples pleaded guilty to felonious assault with a gun, illegal possession of a gun in a liquor permit premises, having a gun under a court sanction and illegally carrying a concealed weapon.
Lott, 21, was convicted in the shooting of felonious assault with a gun and sentenced to five years in prison.
Peoples’ prison sentence also included one year for a previous burglary case in which he received probation.
Reed urged Peoples to turn his life around while in prison and make something of himself.
Peoples’ attorney, Steve Chamberlain, said Peoples has a child now and wants to be part of his child’s life.
“He has other things to live for including a child,” Chamberlain said.
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