Warren man pleads guilty in attack case

The victim in the robbery followed her attacker even after he shot at her.
By ED RUNYAN
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
WARREN -- A 22-year-old Warren man has pleaded guilty to robbery, burglary, felonious assault and tampering with evidence after an attack on a 44-year-old city woman Oct. 11 in the driveway of a house on Oak Circle.
LaShawn Smith, of Lener Avenue Southwest, agreed to a plea Friday in the Trumbull County Common Pleas courtroom of Judge Andrew Logan that would have him spending 12 years in prison.
He will be sentenced after a presentence investigation. He is being held in Trumbull County Jail on $350,000 cash or surety bond.
A woman told police she was dropping Smith off at the residence on Oak Circle when he pulled a gun and told her he wanted money. The woman had given Smith a ride because she knew his family, she said.
The woman said she ran from Smith to the rear of the home, and he shot at her and took her money.
Fired another shot
After Smith fled on foot, the woman said she started looking for him and spotted him at a house on Jackson Street Southwest. She went behind the house and saw him trying to climb a fence. He spotted her and shot at her again, a police report states.
Officers located Smith at a house on Oak Street, and after a couple of failed attempts to apprehend him at different locations by telling him to get on the ground, an officer shot him with an electro-shock gun, and he was arrested.
Smith's aggravated robbery and aggravated burglary charges carry prison sentences of three to 10 years each; the felonious assault charge carries a sentence of two to 10 years; and the tampering with evidence charge was one to five years.
Three of the charges also carry gun specifications, which add three-year mandatory prison terms.