Man gets six years for August ’15 robberies
By Joe Gorman
YOUNGSTOWN
Jarel Gadson told Judge John Durkin just before he was sentenced Thursday on five counts of aggravated robbery that the experience has changed him and he “learned my lesson.”
The Mahoning County Common Pleas Court judge, however, pointed to an October arrest on a weapons charge while he was out on bond for the robberies – and said he was not so sure.
“That is something that raises a lot of red flags to me,” Judge Durkin said.
Gadson, 21, of Alameda Avenue, was sentenced to six years in prison for the robberies that occurred in August 2015. Four of the counts involved the robberies of Youngstown State University students in neighborhoods around the campus but not the campus itself, while the fifth robbery was of a man who arranged to meet Gadson to sell a pair of shoes in a Tyrell Avenue apartment complex.
Assistant Prosecutor Meghan Brundege said she originally sought a four-year sentence but she asked the judge Thursday to give Gadson six years because of his arrest while free on bond in October, after he already had pleaded guilty.
Gadson said he made “bad decisions,” at the time, which led to his arrest after a traffic stop by city police and a gun was found in the car. He said the experience has changed him, and he does not want to repeat it.
“I’m going to make this my first time and my last time,” Gadson said. “I don’t intend on coming through these doors again.”
Gadson’s attorney, Michael Kivlighan, asked Judge Durkin to stick to the four years that was originally agreed on, saying that these are the first felonies Gadson has ever received. Gadson is a former East High School basketball player who played at Wright State University for one year.
Judge Durkin said that it’s puzzling to explain Gadson’s conduct: “I can’t imagine what happened to get to, literally, from zero to a hundred as it relates to these offenses,” the judge said. “It’s like you dove off a cliff.”
Gadson, who hugged his girlfriend before he was led away by deputy sheriffs, was given credit for 279 days he served in jail while the case was pending. The weapons case against him also is pending before Judge Maureen Sweeney.