Pleas come on verge of trials

July 10, 2013 at 12:00a.m.

YOUNGSTOWN

Two men who were involved in a chase with Austintown police from an adult-entertainment club, in which shots were fired, entered guilty pleas Tuesday — the day jury selection in their trials was set to begin.

Eddie Laviena, 22, of Walter Street, entered a plea to a charge of felonious assault, with a gun specification.

Rogelio Rojas Pena, 25, of Guss Street, pleaded guilty to the charge of failure to comply, with a gun specification.

A third man, Luis Parrilla, 32, of North Lane Avenue, is expected to plead guilty later, a court spokeswoman said.

All three were set to go on trial before Judge Maureen Sweeney of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court for a chase that started from the Go Go Cabaret on Clarkins Drive on April 9, 2011.

Reports said an Austintown police officer was on patrol near the parking lot when he thought he saw a man holding a gun. When he drove closer to investigate, the man ran toward the club, then gunfire broke out. The officer headed toward the gunfire when a car pulled away, and the officer followed the car onto state Route 46 and then Interstate 80.

The officer said that someone in the car fired a shot at him, and he managed to pull the car over on the interstate with help from the Ohio State Highway Patrol. The car would move several feet slowly each time the officer approached until it finally came to a complete stop, reports said. Police said Pena was the driver.

Officers found a .40-caliber handgun where the car had pulled off the interstate initially, reports said.

The plea agreement calls for Pena to receive a sentence of 41/2 years. The first three years will run concurrent to a federal sentence he is now serving on a drug charge, giving him an additional year and a half to serve after his federal sentence is completed. He also faces sentencing on another federal charge next month, and his common-pleas sentence will not be handed down until after he receives that sentence.

Laviena’s sentencing has not been set yet. His plea agreement calls for a sentence of five years.