Tuesday, November 21, 2017
By Joe Gorman
YOUNGSTOWN
Family members of a man sentenced Monday to 21 years in prison Monday for a 2014 shooting death during a drug deal stormed out of a Mahoning County Common Pleas Court courtroom.
One man shouted an expletive as Judge Lou D’Apolito handed down his sentence to Stashawn Dates, 19, who pleaded guilty in October to a charge of involuntary manslaughter, two counts of aggravated robbery and two counts of felonious assault with firearm specifications for the death of 21-year-old Jesse Daviduk of Struthers.
Others were crying as they left the courtroom and their cries could be heard inside the courtroom echoing through the courthouse.
Ashley Daviduk, sister of the victim, said she was upset that Dates will still get to see his family while her brother has been taken from his family forever.
“He [Dates] gets to see his parents. My brother is still six feet under,” Ashley Daviduk said. “How is that right?”
Assistant Prosecutor Dawn Cantalamessa said Daviduk and another person had set up a marijuana sale with Dates and another man. She said Dates was in a van with Daviduk and the other person when he shot Daviduk in the back of the head while it was moving, then fell out of the van, hit his head on the ground and was taken to the hospital by the person who was with him.
Cantalamessa said Dates never named the person who was with him.
Ross Smith, Dates’ lawyer, said there is no evidence to show that Dates was ever in the van but Cantalamessa said Dates confessed to being in the van and also had injuries from falling out of it.
Smith asked for a sentence of 13 years, saying this his client was just 16 when he was arrested for the crime before the case was bound over from juvenile court to common pleas court. He said Dates was hanging around with adults who were troublemakers and that clouded his judgment.
Dates apologized to the Daviduks and his own family. He said he realizes he made a bad decision and wants to use his time in prison to better himself and learn to make better choices.
Judge D’Apolito lamented the fact that a young life was taken and another was ruined. He said it always baffles him that people do not think before they enter into a situation where guns and drugs are present.
“I don’t know when, if at all, that society will realize guns and drugs represent a horrible outcome, and this is as horrible as it gets,” Judge D’Apolito said.