What authorities describe as a New Year’s Eve bedroom-window shooting has led an 18-year-old Springfield man to plead guilty to first-degree felony attempted murder with a firearm specification and to having weapons while under disability. The plea was entered last week, and sentencing is set for April 17 at 10 a.m.
Officers were dispatched to the 1800 block of Tibbetts Avenue just before 3 p.m. on Dec. 31, where they found a 19-year-old woman on a living-room couch. She was taken to Springfield Regional Medical Center, then transferred to Miami Valley Hospital, according to the Springfield News-Sun. Court records reviewed by the paper note that the Clark County Sheriff’s Office K-9 unit assisted at the scene and that Viers had been headed for trial before changing course and entering the plea.
A witness told police they saw a man behind the house "pointing a pistol with a green laser beam" moments before shots ripped through the victim’s bedroom window, the report states. Officers later found Viers hiding in a nearby shed. He told a detective that he and his girlfriend "had been having issues recently and he shot into her bedroom four times with his pistol," according to an affidavit cited by the Springfield News-Sun.
What the Plea Means in Court
The firearm specification attached to the attempted-murder charge can trigger a mandatory prison term that must be served consecutively in certain situations, and the statute that creates that specification lays out how judges must stack those extra years at sentencing, according to the Ohio Revised Code. The weapons-under-disability charge is a third-degree felony under state law and carries a potential prison term if the court decides to impose it, per the Ohio Revised Code.
Next Steps
Viers is scheduled to return to Clark County Municipal Court for sentencing on April 17. Police had taken him into custody less than an hour after the shooting, and earlier coverage notes that officers were first called to the Tibbetts Avenue block around 2:50 p.m. on Dec. 31; see WHIO for the initial reporting.
