COURT Youngstown man enters guilty plea on drug trafficking charge

The South Side man faces a possible two-year prison term.
YOUNGSTOWN -- A city man who ran away from a common pleas courtroom hallway to avoid arrest has pleaded guilty to charges of drug trafficking and failure to appear.
Judge R. Scott Krichbaum of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court accepted the pleas of Donald Thompkins, 18, of East Myrtle Avenue, at a hearing Friday. The judge delayed sentencing pending a presentence report from the Ohio Adult Parole Authority.
Thompkins also stipulated to plead guilty to the charge of contempt of court, and the judge sentenced him to eight days in the county jail.
Patrick R. Pochiro, an assistant county prosecutor, and Atty. Mark Cervello, who represents Thompkins, worked out a plea agreement to reduce Thompkins' aggravated drug trafficking charge to drug trafficking.
A fourth-degree felony carries a maximum of 18 months in prison. A fifth-degree felony has a maximum one-year prison term.
Thompkins also waived his right to have his charge of failure to appear, a felony, heard by a grand jury. Instead, he pleaded guilty to the charge through a prosecutor's bill of information, which is similar to an indictment.
Failure to appear also carries a maximum term of 18 months in prison.
Wide range of options
The judge could sentence Thompkins to 2 1/2 years in prison if he rules that the terms be served consecutively. He also could put Thompkins on probation.
Thompkins showed up late for a pretrial meeting on the drug trafficking charge last week. Judge Krichbaum, who let him out of the county jail through the early-release mechanism to reduce the jail's inmate population, then ordered a warrant for his arrest.
When Thompkins appeared in the courtroom's hallway looking for his lawyer, the judge's staff notified deputies working the courthouse security detail to arrest him.
When deputies arrived and attempted to put Thompkins in handcuffs, he ran out of the hallway, somehow eluded deputies and got out of the courthouse.
Deputies found him a few minutes later hiding on the floor of a vehicle parked at West Boardman and Market streets.