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Man pleads to misdemeanors in child endangering case
By Joe Gorman
YOUNGSTOWN
The boyfriend of a woman convicted last month of four felony counts of child endangering pleaded guilty Tuesday in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court to two misdemeanors.
Albert Barnette, 41, was sentenced to two years’ probation and given a suspended jail sentence of a year after pleading guilty before Judge Maureen Sweeney to two counts of contributing to the unruliness or delinquency of a minor.
The plea was agreed upon between defense attorney Ross Smith and Assistant Prosecutor Jennifer McLaughlin.
On April 28, Barnette’s girlfriend, Tamara Julious, was convicted by a jury after a trial on four felony counts of child endangering. Prosecutors said Julious would punish two of her children by putting them in a room called a “slave punishment room” that was devoid of furniture and had no toilet. They said she withheld food from them when they were being punished, beat them with a belt and would dress them in embarrassing clothes or cut their hair in embarrassing ways and send them to school to get mocked.
Prosecutors said the children, an 8-year-old girl and 9-year-old boy, were abused between November 2014 and January 2015. Julious has been in the Mahoning County jail since she was convicted and has yet to be sentenced. The pair were indicted in March 2015.
McLaughlin said the charges and sentence was appropriate for Barnette because there is no evidence that he beat the children or took part in their punishments. McLaughlin said Julious, as their mother, had more of a duty to protect them.
“The mom is the primary offender,” McLaughlin said.
Barnette declined to speak before he was sentenced.
Judge Sweeney also ordered Barnette to attend a parenting class and said if he violates any part of his probation, she will sentence him to the county jail. The charges Barnette pleaded guilty to are first-degree misdemeanors, which carry a maximum sentence of 180 days in jail.