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Elgin arsonist sentenced to 5½ years prison for repeat DUI

A 37-year-old Elgin man who went to prison for arson was sentenced to 5½ years in prison after pleading guilty to aggravated DUI.

James R. Beavers Jr., of the 500 block of Cumberland Circle, was arrested on DUI charges in 2014 and 2015 while on parole and out on bond, respectively.

Beavers' defense attorney, Liam Dixon, said the two arrests, which carried a combined maximum term of 22 years in prison, hopefully will motivate his client to seek help while behind bars.

"The closeness of these two (arrests) has made him grow up a bit," Dixon said. "We're hoping he's going to get some alcohol treatment when he's in prison and he will continue on with it when he's released."

Under state law, Beavers will serve half of the sentence for aggravated DUI, which carried a top penalty of seven years.

He also must pay nearly $6,000 in court fines and costs and will receive credit for 75 days spent at the Kane County jail while the case was pending.

Beavers pleaded guilty last week to aggravated DUI from February 2015 in Elgin, according to Dixon and court records.

Beavers was arrested on charges of speeding, had a blood-alcohol concentration of .281 and became belligerent when placed in his cell, according to police.

At the time, he was free on bond on charges of aggravated DUI and filing a false police report in an April 2014 arrest in Elgin in which police said he crashed into a house near Division Street and Hill Avenue and lied that the car was stolen.

The charges from the 2014 incident, which carried up to 15 years in prison and occurred while Beavers was on parole, were dismissed by prosecutors.

Beavers was sentenced to prison in a split verdict on charges from 2009 that he burned down his parents house in Elgin and fought with firefighters responding to the scene. A firefighter pulled Beavers' 2-year-old son, who was inside the house strapped in a high chair while smoke swirled around him, to safety.

Beavers was acquitted in 2011 of burning down his parents' Elgin home but convicted of arson in torching his girlfriend's clothes in a fire pit.

Beavers served half of the nine-year term and was released in spring 2014. Beavers had two previous DUI convictions before his most recent guilty plea, records show.

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