NEWPORT — A Newport man will serve six months in jail after pleading guilty in Sullivan Superior Court on Thursday to accidentally shooting and wounding his neighbors’ toddler.
Throughout Timothy Hale’s sentencing hearing, now-3-year-old Lennox Martioski romped among and snuggled with her parents and several other relatives.
Shortly before Superior Court Judge Brian Tucker ordered Hale, 52, to serve his sentence, Lennox climbed with a smile into the arms of her mother, Cynthia Belrose, who was reading a statement describing the trauma the family endured in the aftermath of the accidental shooting.
“She came within an inch of not being here today,” Belrose began, later telling Hale that while she and her fiance, Lennox’s father John Martioski, “do not wish you any ill will … we’ll never understand what went through your head.”
Hale, who is disabled and acknowledges having drunk a six-pack of beer earlier in the day April 14, surrendered to police without incident after firing a 12-gauge shotgun at his ceiling while sitting in his bedroom in his ground-floor apartment at 147 Laurel St. The birdshot penetrated into Martioski and Belrose’s apartment and hit Lennox, who was sleeping on the floor, in the right knee. Lennox underwent five hours of surgery and wore a cast until early July, shortly after her third birthday.
“I will never get those images out of my head,” Belrose said during her statement.
Hale acknowledged acting recklessly at the sentencing.
“I’m very, very sorry. Truly,” he said.
Tucker said after Hale completes his sentence, he cannot own firearms or drink alcohol during a five-year probationary period. If Hale violates those conditions, he would be subject to incarceration at the New Hampshire State Prison for Men in Concord.
Sullivan County prosecutors initially charged Hale with first-degree assault and second-degree assault as well as reckless conduct with a deadly weapon, which has a sentence of two to five years in state prison.
On Thursday, Assistant County Attorney Justin Hersh told the judge he worked out a reduced plea agreement with Hale and his lawyer, while also consulting Lennox’s family, because of Hale’s regret.
“Mr. Hale never intended to harm this little girl,” Hersh said in support of the sentence. “Mr. Hale had a friendly relationship with these folks. … Mr. Hale was remorseful right from the beginning.”
Despite the reduced charges, Hersh said “a period of incarceration is entirely appropriate” because Hale had been drinking.
The shooting, while unintentional — Hale told investigators that he had grabbed the gun after awakening to what he thought was an intruder — “is a reflection of the dangerousness of the combination of alcohol use and the use of firearms,” Hersh said. “It’s a reflection of what this kind of conduct can result in.”
The shooting was one of five, in mostly domestic settings, that rocked Newport between December 2018 and July 2019.
The others included:
■A 75-year-old woman who authorities say was killed by her husband, who has dementia.
■Two teens who were shot after what police say was a botched drug deal on Oak Street.
■A 24-year-old man who was shot during an altercation among neighbors over a shared driveway.
■A caregiver who ran to safety after the 80-year-old man she was caring for, who is in a wheelchair, allegedly fired at her. She was uninjured.
Pointing to those incidents, Hersh said prosecutors knew that it was “important to keep firearms out of (Hale’s) hands.”
Hale will serve his sentence at the county House of Corrections in Unity starting Jan. 28.
David Corriveau can be reached at dcorriveau@vnews.com and at 603-727-3304.