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Man not allowed to have a gun racks up fourth gun arrest in three years
By Joe Gorman
YOUNGSTOWN
A man police said was caught with a gun late Thursday on a South Side street racked up his fourth arrest since 2014 for being a felon in illegal possession of a firearm and his second since May 29.
DeMario Hoyt, 22, of Bruce Street, was arraigned Friday in municipal court before Judge Robert Milich on the charge after he was arrested about 10:30 p.m. at East Myrtle Avenue and Erie Street after he was pulled over for making an improper turn.
A Mahoning County grand jury indicted Hoyt in June on a charge of being a felon in possession of a firearm, and at the time of his arrest he was free on a $30,000 bond.
Hoyt also has convictions in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court in 2014 and 2016 for being a felon in possession of a firearm. In 2016, he was sentenced to a year in prison. Court records are confusing, however, as to how much of that sentence he served.
On Thursday, reports said after Hoyt was pulled over he was searching for his driver’s license while also leaning against the side of his door. He gave an officer a wrong Social Security number, and when the officer walked back to Hoyt’s car, Hoyt was on the phone telling other people he was pulled over, reports said.
A few minutes later two vehicles showed up and several people got out of them and started walking toward the officers, reports said. The officers ordered the people back to their cars, and they obeyed, reports said. Officers also called for backup and a police dog from Campbell because none of the city police dogs was on duty.
The dog sniffed around the car and indicated it found something near the driver’s-side door. When police searched that part of the car, they found a loaded .45-caliber semiautomatic handgun on the floor next to the door, reports said.
On May 29, Hoyt was arrested after police responded about 2:15 a.m. for a report of two people sitting inside a car on East Evergreen Avenue, and Hoyt was in the driver’s seat. Reports said officers smelled marijuana coming from the car. When Hoyt was ordered to get out of the car, police could see a .45-caliber handgun that was later found to be loaded in the side of the driver’s door, reports said. Reports said Hoyt was also wearing a bulletproof vest at the time. A grand jury indicted him July 13 on a charge of illegal possession of a weapon.
In the 2014 case, court records show Hoyt was sentenced to probation. He later violated probation, but records do not show what sentence, if any, he received for that violation.