Seven years for domestic assault

Five years of 12-year sentence suspended

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BROOKINGS – A Volga man who admitted to beating a woman he was living with earlier this year has been sentenced to seven years in prison. 

Gavin Howell, 32, pleaded guilty last month to aggravated assault domestic violence with a deadly weapon. The Class 3 felony is punishable by up to 15 years in prison and a $30,000 fine.

The charge dates back to April 13, when a deputy was called to the Brookings Domestic Abuse Shelter for a report of domestic assault and rape.

A Brookings County grand jury indicted Howell in June for second-degree rape – use of force, coercion or threats; aggravated assault-domestic violence; and simple assault – domestic violence.

In exchange for Howell’s plea to aggravated assault, the other two charges were dismissed.

At sentencing this week, Brookings County State’s Attorney Abigail Howard said this wasn’t the first violent incident the victim experienced. But after the April 13 assault, the victim gathered her kids and her belongings and got out, turning to the domestic abuse shelter for help. She was covered in bruises when she went to the hospital for treatment.

Howard said the assault tore apart a family, but the victim told Howard that she had to leave and press charges because she couldn’t let her children “think that this is what love is.”

Howard said Howell has issues with alcohol, and he shouldn’t be around children.

The prosecutor asked the judge to consider the maximum 15 years in prison and “send a message that this behavior is unacceptable and will not be tolerated.”

Defense attorney Ben Kleinjan said Howell wants a relationship with his children and is trying to straighten his life out. 

Kleinjan said that Howell was charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon because he threatened the victim with a pool cue. This was the first incident of this scale and Howell’s first felony, he added.

Kleinjan said Howell is an alcoholic who has been on the edge for a long time, and he’s dealing with some internal conflict that makes him angry and depressed when he’s drinking.

Howell then apologized to his and the victim’s families. He said he needed to overcome his drinking habit and “make things right.”

Circuit Judge Greg Stoltenburg agreed that there’s something inside Howell that, when he drinks, he “becomes a mean individual, a mean drunk to the people who are closest to you.”

Describing the April 13 incident, Stoltenburg told Howell, “You beat the living crap out of her, threatened her with a pool cue, threw her down … and then decided she wanted to have sex with you.”

“You raped her. That’s what you did. The person who loved you most. Figure out what’s wrong with that picture,” Stoltenburg added.

Stoltenburg then sentenced Howell to 12 years in the South Dakota state penitentiary.

Five of those years are suspended on condition that Howell pay $500 in fines and court costs, $673 in restitution, and court-appointed attorney fees.

He also has to remain law abiding while on probation and follow the rules and regulations of the Board of Pardons and Paroles.

Howell got credit for two days of pre-trial detention and was remanded to the custody of the sheriff’s office for transport to the penitentiary.

Contact Jill Fier at jfier@brookingsregister.com.