YOUNGSTOWN Judge refuses to lower bond
The teen-ager is not a terror to the community, his lawyer said.
By BOB JACKSON
VINDICATOR COURTHOUSE REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- A judge in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court refused to lower the bond Friday for one of three 16-year-olds charged with breaking into homes and beating the occupants in January.
Lamont Belcher of Willis Avenue is being held in the county jail on a $100,000 bond, charged with attempted aggravated murder, two counts of aggravated burglary and felonious assault, three counts of aggravated robbery and kidnapping, one count of receiving stolen property, failure to comply with a police order and possession of cocaine.
The bond was set in juvenile court, before the cases were transferred to common pleas where the teens will be tried as adults.
Request: Defense attorney Ted Macejko Jr. asked that the bond be reduced to an amount Belcher's family can pay so he can be out of jail while he awaits trial. He said Belcher has no prior felony record and is not a risk to flee if he's released.
"I just don't believe that at age 16, Lamont Belcher falls into the category of being a terror to the citizens of Youngstown," Macejko said.
Timothy Franken, assistant prosecutor, said $100,000 is a reasonable bond in this case. He discounted Macejko's argument that Belcher isn't a flight risk, saying that Belcher was caught only after a police chase in which he was driving a car stolen from one of the victims.
"The only thing that stopped him was a tree," Franken said.
Denied: Judge R. Scott Krichbaum said that $100,000 is "more than fair" and that for these crimes the bond could be $50,000 to $100,000 per count. He went along with leaving the bond intact, though, since the prosecutor had no objection.
Belcher and the others, James Goins and Chad Barnette, both of East Indianola Avenue, are accused of beating 85-year-old William Sovak and locking him in a fruit cellar at his Miller Street home.
Sovak has filed a civil lawsuit against the suspects in common pleas court, seeking more than $1 million in damages for his injuries.
They are also suspected of kicking in the door of a house on Marmion Avenue and assaulting the occupants, Elizabeth and Louis Luchisan, with a sawed-off rifle, and robbing them. It was their car, officials allege, that Belcher was driving when police caught up to him. Goins and Barnette were also in the car.