Dale Leslie Schwab Jr. has been a model prisoner and completed his education while serving a 20-year-term for his part in the killing of a homeless man in 1997, his attorney told a judge Friday.
“To a significant degree, he has pretty much turned around his life,” Everett lawyer Steve Garvey told Snohomish County Superior Court Judge Kenneth Cowsert.
That’s one reason Schwab should have gotten a break when he was sentenced Friday for the same death, this time for first-degree manslaughter, Garvey said.
The judge disagreed and accepted the recommendation of deputy prosecutor Craig Matheson, imposing about 16 years behind bars for Schwab.
The case came back to court after two controversial state Supreme Court decisions that tossed out scores of second-degree murder convictions statewide. Several of 21 Snohomish County cases have already come back to Superior Court, with various outcomes.
Schwab, 38, was convicted in 1998 of second-degree murder and manslaughter. In 1999, the state Court of Appeals vacated the manslaughter conviction, saying Schwab couldn’t be convicted twice for the same crime because of double jeopardy.
Earlier this month, Cowsert reinstated the manslaughter conviction and set Friday for sentencing.
Garvey argued that Schwab was less culpable than another man in the death of Ernest Sena, 38, who was beaten and placed on railroad tracks in front of a moving freight train.
Schwab already has served most of the sentence imposed Friday, and with time off for good behavior should be out of prison in a little more than three years.
“The way he told me is the way I know he’s remorseful,” Garvey told Cowsert.
Schwab apologized to Sena’s family members, who were not at the hearing. Schwab said he relives the tragedy every day, “knowing I played a role in the death of another human being.”
He asked the judge for leniency based on his lesser role in the killing.
Cowsert noted that the other participant in the death, Aaron Steven Beymer, then 18, received the top end of the sentencing range. Schwab had five prior felony convictions at the time of the killing, which meant more time in prison. Cowsert said it was fair that Schwab also receive the top end of the sentencing range for his role.
His mother, Sherri Cooper of Marysville, didn’t think that was fair.
“I think they’re making an example of Dale” because of the state Supreme Court nullifying so many convictions, Cooper said.
The court maneuverings are not over. Garvey said he’ll appeal the original conviction, saying the court in 1998 should have instructed the jury that he could be found guilty of a lesser crime.
“So there may be another trial,” Garvey said.
He also will appeal Cowsert’s decision to reinstate the manslaughter conviction after it was vacated in 2001 by the state Court of Appeals.
Reporter Jim Haley: 425-339-3447 or haley@heraldnet.com.
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