Probation for former police officer

CASSOPOLIS -- A former Ontwa Township-Edwardsburg police officer who admitted to stealing prescription medication from a residence where he responded to a 911 call last Christmas Eve was sentenced Friday in Cass County Circuit Court to two years of probation.

Despite Cass Prosecutor Victor Fitz’s call for a maximum 20-month prison term, Judge Michael Dodge suspended a one-year jail term for Jesse Holmes, 24, of Dowagiac, providing that Holmes complies with terms of his probation. The judge pointed out Holmes, who earlier entered a no-contest plea to a first-degree home invasion felony charge, already had paid a high price by losing his job in law enforcement.

Dodge included in his sentence a stipulation that Holmes perform 300 hours of community service, recommending that it include speaking engagements at a police academy and/or high school class. The judge also ordered that Holmes receive counseling and a substance abuse assessment.

The latter seemed to stem from the one unanswered question in the case: Why did Holmes commit the crime? Holmes shed no light on it when he admitted making “a terrible mistake,’’ emphasizing he had intended no disrespect to the police department.

Perhaps J. Thomas Schaeffer, Holmes’ attorney, explained it best.

“At the time, he didn’t realize how wrong it was,’’ he said.

Dodge said Holmes had responded to a medical emergency on South Shore Drive in Edwardsburg in which the resident was having difficulty breathing. After ambulance personnel placed the man on a gurney for transport to a hospital, the residence was secured, Dodge said, but a neighbor observed Holmes return about 20 minutes later and enter the house through a sliding glass door.

Dodge said Holmes took a bottle of hydrocodone pills, a pain-killing medication, but later “thought better of it’’ and flushed the pills down a toilet. The empty prescription bottle was found in a Dumpster behind the police department, the judge said.

Dodge referred to the sentencing as “very difficult,’’ adding he’d never before sentenced a former police officer, and ended up deviating below Holmes’ 12- to 20-month guideline range. Shaeffer requested that Holmes serve his probation in Calhoun County, Mich., pointing out he has a job waiting in security in Albion.

Also Friday, a Dowagiac area man already serving an 18- to 30-year prison sentence for a first-degree criminal sexual conduct offense was sentenced to a concurrent 15- to 30-year term for yet another sex crime. Fitz referred to Daniel Evans’ molestation of a 7-year-old girl in 2006 and 2007 as “horrifying,’’ mentioning Evans had displayed a knife during the crime.

Evans already is registered as a sex offender and will be subject to lifetime electronic monitoring after he’s released.

LMumford@SBTinfo.com

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