Man convicted of burglary gets sentence

YOUNGSTOWN -- A 30-year-old Charlotte Avenue man was sentenced Monday to eight years in prison after a Mahoning County Common Pleas Court jury convicted him of burglary.
The six-man, six-woman jury deliberated less than an hour before returning the verdict against David Bridgeforth. Judge R. Scott Krichbaum sentenced him immediately after the verdict.
Defense attorney Ted Macejko Jr. asked the judge to impose less than the maximum sentence, arguing that Bridgeforth is married with children and has been working since he was released from prison in 2000 on an unrelated felony offense.
But Assistant Prosecutor Kelly Johns asked for the maximum term of eight years, citing Bridgeforth's past record of three felony convictions for aggravated burglary.
He was placed on probation for the first conviction, which came in 1990, and was sentenced to seven to 25 years in prison for the second conviction, which came in 1991. He was released on shock probation after serving about nine months.
Bridgeforth was convicted a third time in 1993 and sentenced to 10 to 25 years in prison. According to Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction records, he was paroled in January 2000 after serving about 61/2 years. Bridgeforth said he was disappointed by the verdict but accepts it.
"I got a fair trial," he said.
Johns said the victim, Marquita Gilbert of Oak Street, returned home June 30, 2002, and saw Bridgeforth leaving her house. He jumped into a waiting car and fled to another woman's house, where police found him a short time later with items taken from Gilbert's house.