A local judge has rejected a plea agreement proposed for a Bullhead City resident charged in separate assaults. Judge Billy Sipe said the deal requiring a 3.5 year prison term for 26-year-old Luis Romero was too lenient.
“I just simply cannot accept this limitation,” Sipe said during a Tuesday hearing in Kingman. Sipe said Romero deserves more prison time for separate attacks last year; one involving a girlfriend and the other a man who was beaten inside and outside of a vehicle in the 2000 block of Highway 95.
“This is a case where the defendant severely beat the victim with brass knuckles,” Sipe said. Glue and staples were used to close gashes that the victim suffered to his head.
Sipe noted Romero also hurt his girlfriend during a separate beating. Sipe said he viewed images of the injured woman whose face and eyes were swollen and bruised.
Defense attorney Ray Lundberg tried to convince Sipe to approve the deal, arguing the state’s case in the girlfriend assault “is weak” and subject to possible acquittal at trial. It was also noted that the male assault victim did not push for prosecution and had not provided any input regarding case outcome.
It was the second time that Judge Sipe rejected a proposed deal for Romero. Sipe refused to accept a plea proposal in March when Romero would not agree with the prosecutor’s recitation of facts surrounding the brass knuckle assault.
Judge Sipe has recused himself from further proceedings involving Romero. The case will be assigned to another judge.
