EVERETT — His first felony conviction has earned an Edmonds teen a long stretch behind bars.
Trevor Jones, 19, was sentenced Tuesday to 15 years in prison for a violent home-invasion robbery that left a disabled man bloodied and battered.
Jones was one of three young men who forced his way into the 56-year-old Lynnwood man’s apartment. The man has cerebral palsy. He was shocked with an electronic stun gun, stabbed and beaten with a hammer.
The March 10 attack left him with a broken clavicle and a punctured lung.
Jones and the two other men, Nicholas Brunson and Joseph Ricks, pleaded guilty to first-degree assault and attempted first-degree robbery. They admitted that the victim was vulnerable. That opened the door for prosecutors to seek a sentence beyond the standard range.
Snohomish County deputy prosecutor Laura Twitchell on Tuesday didn’t press for an exceptional sentence. Instead she asked for the high end within the standard range. By pleading guilty, Jones spared the victim the ordeal of testifying at trial, Twitchell said.
The victim wasn’t at Tuesday’s hearing. He has difficulty traveling, Twitchell explained.
Jones apologized. He said he hopes the victim can forgive him.
Prosecutors suspect that Jones was responsible for stabbing the victim. A witness reported seeing a knife in a bowl of bleach at Jones’ home. Jones told the witness that there was blood on the knife and he needed to get rid of the weapon. The witness later threw the knife in a lake, according to court papers.
On Tuesday, Jones’ attorney, Max Harrison, offered a different version of events, saying Jones was the least culpable of the attackers. He knocked on the door and closed the blinds, but didn’t participate in assaulting the man, Harrison said.
“He can’t explain his behavior,” Harrison said.
Brunson, the suspected ringleader, told investigators that he’d chosen the man because he was weak and feeble. He also admitted that after the attack he thought about going back to “finish him off,” court papers said.
Instead, the trio left the man’s apartment, cleaned up and went to a rave party.
Ricks was sentenced last month to slightly more than 14 years in prison. Brunson is scheduled to be sentenced later this month.
Diana Hefley: 425-339-3463; hefley@heraldnet.com.
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