BANGOR, Maine — In September 2011, 20-year-old Randall J. Cressey of Hampden stood before a District Court judge for sentencing on burglary and theft charges.
“I would like to change my life,” he told Judge Jesse Gunther, who is now retired. “This definitely has woken me up.”
On Friday, Cressey, now 24, stood before Gunther’s replacement, Judge John Lucy, at the Penobscot Judicial Center and pleaded no contest to nearly 30 burglary and theft charges in connection with nighttime break-ins last April in Veazie, Orrington and Bangor.
No contest pleas result in convictions.
Cressey of Hampden was sentenced 3½ years ago to 18 months in prison, where he met his co-defendant in the current case, William C. Cushman, 23, of Brewer.
Lucy sentenced Cressey on Friday to 10 years with all but five years suspended, followed by three years probation. That is the same sentence Cushman received.
The judge also ordered Cressey, Cushman and their three co-defendants to pay jointly $11,078 in restitution to victims. Cressey still owes about $3,000 in restitution to victims of his 2011 crimes.
If either man were to violate probation, they could be sent back to prison for up to five years, Lucy said.
That was little comfort to the victims of what Michael Roberts, deputy district attorney for Penobscot County, said were drug-related crimes.
“What is this, a 50 percent discount?” a Veazie homeowner whose residence was burglarized on April 11, 2014, told the judge. “I am outraged. They should do the full maximum sentence of 10 years.”
The Bangor Daily News is not identifying the victim.
He told Lucy that as a boy growing up in Washington County, his father, who was a teacher, gave him a silver dollar for good report cards. Over the years, he saved the coins.
“They stole them and probably took them to a pawn shop,” he said. “They’ll never be recovered.”
The Veazie man said that the thieves also took a firearm and he worried that for the time between the break-ins and the burglars’ arrests that the gun would be used to harm someone. The gun was recovered when Cressey and Cushman were arrested April 19.
Three others, Bianca Trask, 20, of Brewer, Courtney Braley, 19, of Bangor and a now 17-year-old male from Bangor also were charged in connection with the break-ins. They entered into deferred disposition deals under which the charges are dismissed after a year if they are not charged with additional crimes, Roberts said last month.
The Penobscot County Sheriff’s Office, as well as the Brewer, Veazie and Bangor police departments collaborated on the investigation.