Teen gets 35 years in prison for fatal 2021 shooting, plus 4 other recent Sheboygan County sentencings
SHEBOYGAN – A Milwaukee teen was sentenced June 30 to 35 years in prison for a 2021 shooting that killed a 16-year-old Sheboygan boy.
Armani Jackson, 18, pleaded no contest to shooting the teen near the bus stop in the 800 block of Center Avenue on Oct. 29, 2021.
Here's more on that case, as well as other Sheboygan County cases that have wrapped up with sentencings during the last few weeks.
Milwaukee teen gets 35 years in prison for killing 16-year-old Sheboygan boy at bus stop in 2021
Sheboygan County Circuit Court Judge Kent Hoffmann sentenced Jackson to prison followed by 20 years of extended supervision for second-degree intentional homicide after Jackson pleaded no contest to the charge.
Kilek Mack, 16, of Sheboygan, was shot three times in the chest and abdomen. He was transported to Children's Wisconsin Hospital in Wauwatosa, where he died.
Jackson, then also 16, was arrested days later, and initially charged with first-degree intentional homicide.
In October 2022, Jackson entered a no-contest plea to the lesser charge of second-degree intentional homicide, and a sentencing date was set for January. However, in December, Jackson filed a motion to withdraw his plea.
In January, Jackson's attorney withdrew as counsel, and Jackson had to be assigned a new public defender. In April, Hoffmann denied Jackson's request to withdraw his no-contest plea, and the June 30 sentencing date was scheduled.
Police said video surveillance showed Jackson and his girlfriend get off a bus on that Friday afternoon and walk to the station's warming shelter, where Mack was sitting.
The video footage showed as Jackson entered the warming shelter, Mack stood up and walked toward him. Jackson then reached into his front waistband area and punched toward Mack’s face, police said. The two continued fighting as they moved toward the alley near the warming shelter, where Jackson was seen pulling a gun out of his waistband and shooting Mack. Afterward, he fled on foot, according to police.
Jackson's girlfriend and her mother were both convicted of harboring or aiding a felon in connection with the case. In June 2022, Jackson's girlfriend was sentenced to three years of probation, while her mother was sentenced to one year in prison followed by two years of extended supervision.
RELATED: Sheboygan prosecutors charge teenager with first-degree intentional homicide in fatal shooting
23-year-old man sentenced to five years in prison for July 4 shooting
A 23-year-old man was sentenced to five years in prison for shooting a man on July 4, 2022.
LeMarr Washington Jr. pleaded no contest June 16 to second-degree recklessly endangering safety and possessing a firearm while adjudicated of a felony. He was sentenced June 22.
Video surveillance from a nearby business showed Washington pull out a gun around 11:40 p.m. that night during an argument with the victim, a 40-year-old man, according to a criminal complaint. The altercation started after the victim confronted another person for urinating on his fence line, and Washington began yelling at the victim, a witness told police.
The witness said moments before the shooting, Washington and the victim were squaring up for a fight.
The video shows the gun did not discharge after Washington pulled the trigger, and Washington racked another round, the complaint says.
The victim was shot in the upper abdomen, and recovered from his injuries.
Following his time in prison, Washington will face five years of extended supervision.
Former Sheboygan North student sentenced to probation for school shooting threats made in 2019
A 22-year-old Sheboygan man was sentenced June 29 to two years of probation for making a threat to "shoot up North High," in 2019, according to a criminal complaint.
Eric Larson pleaded no contest to making terrorist threats, a Class I felony. A second charge of misdemeanor bail jumping was dropped.
Larson faces a six-month jail sentence if he violates any conditions of probation, according to court records.
According to the complaint, Larson made the threat during a conversation with a teacher and another student in 2019 about recent threats that drew police attention to Sheboygan North High School. The teacher reported that Larson said he would "take care of it," and if he were to do something, he would not post about it on social media.
When asked what he meant, Larson said, "I'll shoot up North High," the complaint says.
The teacher reported the incident to the school resource officer, and Larson was charged in December 2019.
Woman sentenced to four years in prison for maintaining a drug trafficking place
A 40-year-old Sheboygan woman was sentenced to four years in prison followed by two years of extended supervision for maintaining a drug trafficking place.
Amber Rossmiller was initially charged with being party to a crime to both delivering heroin and second-degree recklessly endangering safety after a 55-year-old man died from a heroin overdose in March 2022. She pleaded no contest to the charge of maintaining a drug trafficking place and was sentenced June 22.
Rossmiller was one of three people to face charges in connection with the fatal overdose. Jason Knoll, 46, of Sheboygan, was sentenced to six years in prison in May for first-degree reckless homicide for delivering drugs, as party to a crime. Amy Jo Papendieck, 57, of Milwaukee, was initially charged with manufacturing or delivering heroin and second-degree recklessly endangering safety, but charges against her were dismissed.
According to a criminal complaint, police were dispatched to Martin Avenue in Sheboygan on March 16, 2022, for a report of the overdose.
Papendieck told police both she and the victim had injected heroin, and he died while she was unconscious.
She told police they had obtained the heroin from Rossmiller. Rossmiller said the victim had purchased the heroin from Knoll. Knoll told police he brought drugs from Milwaukee to Sheboygan but denied delivering them to the victim, according to the complaint.
Watertown man sentenced to 10 years in prison for armed robbery of gas station
A 39-year-old Watertown man was sentenced June 12 to 10 years in prison followed by 10 years of extended supervision for robbing a gas station in February 2022.
Michael Pietila was convicted of armed robbery with threat of force, as a repeater, after he pleaded no contest June 12.
The robbery occurred at a gas station on South Eighth Street the evening of Feb. 12, 2022. According to the criminal complaint, the gas station clerk told police a man with a black face mask pulled a knife on her and demanded all of the money in the register. She said she pressed the panic alarm and estimated she gave him more than $100.
Police found Pietila after reviewing surveillance videos from the store. Earlier in the day, two men entered the store and asked the owner what an employee would do if someone were to break in, according to the complaint. In the surveillance footage, police determined one of the two men was wearing some of the same clothing as the man who robbed the store that evening.
Police identified the man who was with the robbery suspect earlier in the day, and went to his address. There, they found Pietila walking nearby, still wearing the clothing seen in the surveillance footage, and arrested him.
Pietila had a knife, cash and a lottery scratch-off ticket that surveillance video showed had been purchased that morning at the gas station.
Pietila was convicted of armed robbery with threat of force as party to a crime in Waukesha County in 2004, when he was 20. He was sentenced to nine years in prison with six years of extended supervision, consecutive to time in incarceration for three counts of burglary Pietila was convicted of in 2002.
He was released from prison on extended supervision in September 2021, just five months before his arrest for the gas station robbery, according to prison records.
Fulfilling our obligation: This report is part of the Sheboygan Press's mission to follow criminal cases from arrest to their conclusion.
Contact Kelli Arseneau at 920-213-3721 or karseneau@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter at @ArseneauKelli.
This article originally appeared on Sheboygan Press: Sheboygan teen sentenced to prison for bus stop shooting of Kilek Mack
