Man convicted of Addison battery with garden tool gets 24 years
A Chicago man convicted of assaulting an Addison man with a garden tool over an alleged $50 debt is headed to prison.
DuPage County Judge Robert Kleeman on Wednesday sentenced Runaldo Ramsey, 35, to 17 years in prison for home invasion and seven years for the aggravated battery. The sentences will run concurrently.
Kleeman found Ramsey guilty of two counts of aggravated battery and a single count of home invasion during an August bench trial.
Prosecutors said an ex-girlfriend's $50 debt sparked Ramsey's severe beating of 45-year-old Steven Stanley.
Stanley testified during the trial that, just after midnight on June 9, 2012, Ramsey attacked him inside his apartment with a beer bottle and two 3-foot-long gardening weeders, one of which was blunt, the other with a forked end.
After being stabbed above his eye with the garden tool and slipping in his own blood, Stanley thought he "was a dead man" as Ramsey plunged the forked end into the back of his head.
Ramsey on Wednesday continued his denial, telling Kleeman again that he did not batter or stab Stanley and explaining his criminal past on growing up without a father.
"All I need is one shot, Your Honor," Ramsey told Kleeman. "I just need one shot to prove I can make it."
Kleeman, however, said he found Ramsey "properly guilty beyond a reasonable doubt" and doesn't "believe for one second" Ramsey's claims of not being involved in the attack.
Ramsey must serve 85 percent of the 17-year sentence before being eligible for parole.
"Three years ago, (Stanley's) life was forever changed when he was savagely beaten and repeatedly stabbed ... by Runaldo Ramsey. To this day and for the rest of his life, (Stanley) will carry the emotional and physical scars inflicted upon him as a reminder of what (Ramsey) did to him," DuPage County State's Attorney Robert Berlin said in a written statement. "It is my hope that with today's sentence, (Stanley) will find some solace in knowing that the man who is responsible for those scars will spend a significant amount of time behind bars."
Ramsey, of the 2400 block of West Taylor Street, previously was convicted of misdemeanor domestic battery twice since 2010 in DuPage and was on probation for that offense at the time he is accused of attacking Stanley. A third domestic battery case filed against Ramsey in 2011 was dismissed.