Final defendant in motorcycle club killings gets 10 years
WARREN
The refusal of key witnesses to testify against Forever Two Wheelz motorycle club president David Bailes Jr. and two co-defendants in the killing of two rival motorcycle club members and injuring of two others reduced prosecutors’ options.
It led to plea agreements with all three defendants and prison sentences of 10 years for Bailes, eight for James Gardner and six for Charles Dellapenna III, the last of whom learned his sentence Thursday in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court.
The sentences were not long enough for Dana Hughes, wife of Walter Hughes, one of the two members of the Brothers Regime who suffered gunshot wounds but survived the June 18, 2016, shootings.
“The years that have been given are not even close to the years it’s going to take to get my life back on track,” she said at Dellapenna’s sentencing hearing..
“I spent 33 days in the ICU not knowing if he was going to be OK or not,” she said of her husband, adding that he still has more surgeries ahead of him.
“By the time we even get that part of our lives back together, let alone the grief and losses of everybody else, they will be walking the street with their families again, which we will never get to do,” Dana Hughes said of the three defendants.
Read more about the case in Satrurday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.