Man who shot car in 2024 Amherst confrontation gets three years probation

ELYRIA — Lavelle Lewis will be on probation with conditions for the next three years after pleading guilty to shooting at a car he said drove straight at him following a confrontation in Amherst last year. Lewis, 30, of Cleveland apologized Friday in Lorain County Common Pleas Court for getting involved in a dispute at a friend's request. He admitted he brought his gun and a ski mask, but he only shot at the victim's car out of self-defense, he said. Judge Giovanna Bremke granted him community control based on what she said was the lowest Ohio Risk Assessment System system, or ORAS, score she said she'd ever seen. The ORAS scale is used to figure out how likely it is that a defendant will reoffend. Lewis, who pleaded guilty to felonious assault with a forfeiture specification and misdemeanor criminal damaging, has no criminal or traffic record, didn't violate the terms of his GPS monitoring while out on bond and was polite and cooperative with police and the court, Bremke said. Bremke ordered him to pay $725 restitution to the victim and to forfeit his 9 mm Taurus handgun to the state. Amherst police said Lewis shot at the victim and his car in the area of Lincoln Street and Cleveland Avenue in Amherst the morning of April 2, 2024. No one was hit by any bullets and no one was injured. Lewis claimed from the beginning that he fired only in self-defense after the car drove at him. Still, he was charged after what defense attorney Denise Wilms said Friday in court was "a horrible mistake on his part." Lewis and his friends had tried to "oust" someone from a house, a person the homeowner didn't want there, she said. Save for this one incident, Lewis is an upstanding person and married father of four, his attorney said. He cooperated with Amherst police, gave them a full statement and his story never changed, Wilms said. In court, Assistant Lorain County Prosecutor Brian James agreed that was all true. The fact remained, though that Lewis went armed and masked into an already "volatile situation," then fired multiple rounds into a car as it was driving away. "That's our concern," he told Bremke. "What was his reason to go over there except to get into a violent confrontation?" Lewis said his reason was "moral support." He is always armed, he said, and only wore a mask because he has children and didn't know the other person involved in the situation his friend had asked for help with. The victim "was trying to hit me" with the car, Lewis said. "He did circle around. I'm thankful I and he didn't get hurt." Contact Dave O'Brien at (440) 329-7129 or dobrien@chroniclet.com.