Man Who Beat & Robbed Woman Downtown Receives a 15-Year Sentence

The morning of June 21, 2012, Elizabeth West, a 26-year-old working mother, went to her SUV in a parking lot next to her College Avenue office. She encountered Samuel Tyrone Evans rummaging in her car.

The career criminal savagely turned on her and beat her so severely that a passing motorist could hear the blows, even though his windows were up, according to a story in the Athens Banner Herald. The motorist, Dennis Terry, 61, emerged from his vehicle and intervened in the attack, pointing a gun at Evans and threatening to shoot if he didn't stop.

The story says that Evans ran off, taking with him from West's car a semiautomatic pistol, a bag and her camera. He disappeared into the woods and led police on an afternoon manhunt.

On Friday, Superior Court Judge David Sweat sentenced Evans to 15 years in prison, without parole, for the attack, the story says. Last month, Evans was found guilty of aggravated assault, theft by taking, possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime and obstruction of a law enforcement officer, robbery by force, battery.

Elizabeth West pleaded with Judge Sweat to enact a harsh punishment, the story says, telling him that she now suffers from Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. Evans also received five years of probation.