A Snohomish man infatuated with a woman who spurned him earned about 1 1/2 years in prison when he repeatedly fired a 20-gauge shotgun into her Snohomish home Nov. 26.
A Snohomish County Superior Court jury on Thursday convicted Cornelis Wilhemus Floor, 51, of attempted drive-by shooting.
Earlier in the day, Judge Ronald Castleberry also found Floor guilty of being a felon in possession of a firearm. Both are felonies.
Castleberry set Aug. 10 for sentencing.
Floor originally was charged with drive-by shooting, but Castleberry ruled the more serious charge was inappropriate because nobody was home at the time. The law requires that there be a risk of injury to a person for the crime to be a drive-by shooting.
The woman was in the hospital at the time of the shooting, and her son was out for the evening, deputy prosecutor Janice Albert said. A neighbor saw a car in the woman’s driveway and heard someone say “pull” each time there was a shotgun blast.
Snohomish police arrested Floor, and Snohomish County sheriff’s deputies found a shotgun, a box of shells, expended shell casings and empty beer cans in his car, Albert said.
Defense attorney Zachary Fleet of Seattle argued that Floor used birdshot to make it less likely someone would be hurt. Floor didn’t intend to put people at risk and only wanted to damage property, Fleet said.
Although nobody was home, the lights were left on, Albert said. Shots were fired through the woman’s bedroom window and into two other rooms.
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