Man gets 109 years in Bloomington home invasion, rape
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. (AP) - A judge sentenced an Indianapolis man to more than 100 years in prison after pleading guilty to breaking into a Bloomington apartment shared by Indiana University students and raping at least one of them while holding a gun to her head.
Monroe County Judge Marc Kellams cited 20-year-old Michael W.L. Deweese's criminal history and the brutality of the November 2014 crime in handing down the sentence of 109 years and 6 months.
"This was a horrific crime, and it shocks the conscious of our community that such a thing happened," Kellams said.
"No young woman who comes to college should ever have to go through what these young women went through," he said.
Deweese pleaded guilty in February to 15 charges including attempted murder, seven counts of rape, three counts of criminal confinement with injury, armed robbery, and resisting law enforcement.
Two of the three women sharing the apartment were raped, but it wasn't clear whether Deweese raped more than one victim, even though he pleaded guilty to seven counts of rape.
The courtroom was packed for the three-hour-long sentencing hearing, The (Bloomington) Herald-Times reported (http://bit.ly/1ThCyct ).
One of the two women who had been raped wrote a letter to the court, which was read aloud during the hearing, and a second victim's mother wrote a letter, which also was read. A Bloomington police officer who exchanged gunfire with Deweese and a second suspect testified.
Deweese was shot in the leg in the exchange after the suspects fled the victims' apartment near the IU campus. A second suspect, Vaylen Glazebrook, was shot in the arm. A roommate of the two women had called police, who arrived on the scene while the attack was still occurring.
With good behavior, Deweese could be released from prison after serving 82 years.
Glazebrook, 20, faces similar charges as those Deweese. Those charges remain pending.
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Information from: The Herald Times, http://www.heraldtimesonline.com