Jason A. Brown waits to be escorted back to the jail after hearing in Lewis County Superior Court.
By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter
CHEHALIS – The 35-year-old man accused of taking a wallet from an elderly man’s pocket in broad daylight in the parking lot of a Morton grocery store pleaded guilty today to amended charges and was sentenced to one year and one day in prison.
Jason A. Brown, 35, was arrested in early September for the events of Aug. 29 at the Country Market. He was initially charged with second-degree robbery, with police and prosecutors alleging various slightly different versions than a deputy prosecutor described to the judge today.
The 83-year-old victim who lives in Morton was not present in the courtroom in Lewis County Superior Court this morning.
Lewis County Senior Deputy Prosecutor Will Halstead told the judge he dropped the robbery charge and replaced it with a charge of first-degree theft. He said he and defense attorney Kevin Nelson agreed however to recommend the defendant be given a sentence above the standard sentencing range.
Halstead said for robbery, there has to be some kind of violence or threat of violence. He told the judge he watched the surveillance video and saw something slightly different.
The victim walks out of the store and the suspect asks him for a couple of dollars, and the victim says no, according to Halstead.
The images show the victim then gets to his car, the suspect comes up behind him and takes the wallet from his pocket, and then leaves, he said.
When it happened, Morton Police Department Chief Roger Morningstar posted photos of the suspect and the suspect’s car on Facebook, and later reached out to David Rose, host of the television show Washington’s Most Wanted.
On Sept. 8, someone recognized the suspect at the Mossy Mini Shell station, called 911 and followed the suspect to an RV park in Silver Creek, where police subsequently found Brown inside a motorhome and took him into custody.
Brown also pleaded guilty this morning to residential burglary, for an Aug. 21 incident on Southeast First Street when police found him walking out the front door of a house with various items and found the back door kicked in.
Defense attorney Nelson told the judge he felt the resolution was a fair outcome, and that he and his client had talked about pleading guilty from the very beginning.
“Mr. Brown accepts full responsibility for both these acts,” Nelson said.
Judge Joely O’Rourke accepted Brown’s pleas of guilty and sentenced him to one year and a day in both cases, with the time to be served concurrently.
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For background, read “Man who allegedly mugged Morton senior located at Silver Creek campground” from Monday September 11, 2017, here
Tags: By Sharyn L. Decker, news reporter
The taxpayer looses again. Man steals 80 dollars it will cost the taxpayer 20000 dollars to house him for a year. What good will it do? Deter others from doing the same? Revenge? Prove a point? The point being we are stupid as shit throwing away hard earned dollars housing him to “maintain law and order” when our govenment shitting funds down the tube by the billions.
A year and a day for two felonies! What a crock.
His attorney said he accepted full responsibility, but the sob never showed an ounce of remorse!!!
What about the taxpayer who said no to the tax collector the tax collector collected anyway and the county treasurer who embezzled five figures and got less time. I guess the difference is in all how you dress. Community service and restitution would have sufficed. He at least had the balls to ask before he took it!
He would have killed that old man for $20.00 I hope he gets to meet “big Bubba”.