'I had no say.' Disabled Norwich veteran rails against attacker's prison sentence

NORWICH — A 48-year-old Taftville man who two years ago attacked a disabled veteran attempting to assist his father with a medical emergency was sentenced last month to a year in prison, court records show.

Nathan Brown Sr., of 24 N. Fifth Ave, Apt. 310, entered a nolo contendere plea to a second-degree assault charge on Dec. 13 in Norwich Superior Court. In addition to the prison term, Brown was also ordered to serve three years of probation, according to state judicial records.

In a nolo contendere, or no contest, plea, a defendant neither denies nor accepts responsibility for a charge, though a guilty plea is still entered on the record. The defendant agrees to accept an agreed-on sentence, but the lack of a traditional guilty plea can be used as a shield against future civil litigation.

Neil O'Brien, the neighbor Brown attacked on Oct. 31, 2020, said he’s unhappy with how the case was disposed.

“I wanted at least the mandatory two years for him he would have gotten if the charge wasn’t reduced as part of a plea deal,” he said. “Laws are being passed, but not enforced.”

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Police were dispatched to the Wequonnoc Village Apartments complex in Taftville on Halloween night in 2020 for a report of a medical issue involving Brown’s father. On arrival, officers saw medical personnel in the process of transporting O’Brien to the hospital, according to a police report.

O’Brien, a 50-year-old former volunteer firefighter who lived two doors down from Brown’s father, said he overheard a scanner call of a possible heart attack victim in his building and rushed to help, only to be attacked by Brown while trying to render aid to the man’s unconscious relative.

The U.S. Navy veteran, who suffers from neurocardiogenic syncope, a history of head trauma sustained by falls while in the military and post-traumatic stress disorder, said Brown hit him in the head with a beer bottle and his fists after he questioned the man’s decision to pull a beer out of the refrigerator while his father was unresponsive on the ground.

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O’Brien said he was transported to The William W. Backus Hospital and diagnosed with a concussion.

“I’m still suffering major problems: vertigo, more flashbacks, wandering and I’ve had to go back to speech therapy,” he said during a phone interview on Friday. “It’s taken a toll on me mentally.”

Brown, who left the attack scene before officers arrived, told police during a phone call later that night he was angry that O’Brien questioned his decision to get an alcoholic beverage while his father was in distress.

“Nathan, who I could tell was still intoxicated on the phone, was trying to explain what had happened on scene, but it was making absolutely no sense,” Officer Zachary Desmond wrote in a police narrative of the incident. “When I explained to Nathan he could come to the police department to take care of the arrest that night or I could do a warrant for his arrest, he told me to go (expletive) myself and that he didn’t care about a warrant because I was never going to find him.”

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Brown on Dec. 16, 2020 turned himself into Norwich police and was initially charged with third-degree assault and disorderly conduct. O’Brien said the assault charge was later upgraded to count of second-degree assault on a disabled person, a D felony that carries a mandatory two-year prison term for those convicted.

As part of the plea negotiations, the disabled assault charge was reduced to second-degree assault - still a Class D felony, but without an associated mandatory minimum prison penalty, O'Brien said.

“I had no say about the plea deal, which I learned about over the summer,” O’Brien said. “At one point, I literally had to prove to the prosecutors, the defense and a judge with written doctors’ statements that my symptoms weren’t from my first brain injury, but from the attack and that I was more susceptible to injury because of my past injury.”

O’Brien said he reached out to The Bulletin about his case after reading about the Thursday sentencing of Elmar Baker, a Colchester man whose murder charge in connection with the death of Norwich artist Joseph “Jo-Jo” Kolodnicki was reduced to first-degree manslaughter as part of a plea agreement. Kolodnicki’s family members were dismayed at the 17-year sentence for their loved one’s killer, calling it insufficient.

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Plea deals are not unusual in the criminal court system, even for serious charges like murder and assault. Prosecutors locally have given a variety of reasons for accepting such deals, including uncooperative witnesses, a lack of direct evidence or a desire to spare victims and surviving family members the rigors of a trial, which could end with an acquittal.

“But I was willing to testify, if my case went to trial,” O’Brien said. “(Brown) had no defense, no chance at all. All I wanted to do that night was help.”

Brown previously pleaded guilty in 2012 in Norwich court to a charge of third-degree assault and was sentenced to 90 days in jail, according to the state’s judicial website.

John Penney can be reached at jpenney@norwichbulletin.com or at (860) 857-6965.

This article originally appeared on The Bulletin: 1-year sentence for man who attacked Norwich Good Samaritan in 2020