16 Responses to “Shooter sentenced to 30 years”

1. posted by Taneqwa Lewis at May 15, 2008 5:15 pm :
   

   I am a concerned 17 year old senior.As you can see my name; I am one of the baby sister of Dante Lamont Lewis. I feel he shouldn’t get 30 years for the crime he committed. Dont get me wrong Im not saying that he shouldn’t get charged, I am sying that how come he got 30 years? It aint like the man is dead, he is still alive and breathing. As I recall not to long ago, a man shto and murdered 16 year old Robert Lewis and how many years did he get? 30 YEARS.. that is the reason I feel like he shouldn’t have been charged with so much. And that really makes me wonder what uf he did kill that man what would he been sentenced with? I dont want anybody to think I am just sayong this because he is my brother, but I have a question to that ice cream vendor, if the incident occured when they said it did, WHY IN THE WORLD WERE YOU IN A SCHOOL PARKING LOT?!?!?!?! If you wanted to talk to your fiance that bad you should’ve went home. THIS IS JUST HOW I FEEL ABOUT THIS WHOLE SITUATION!!!!!

2. posted by LG at May 15, 2008 10:50 pm :
   

   Wow.

3. posted by David at May 16, 2008 8:16 am :
   

   Violence leavesmany victims…including family members of the offender, but don’t lose sight of some facts here. The ice cream man was working…not stealing. He was pursuing a lawfu activity in a public place, serving children and families. He was not in an alley buying or selling drugs, he was no involved in unlawful conduct.
   He will suffer the effects of the wouund he received for the rest of his life; he may never fully recover his speech. Thirty years in a long time, and prison is not a nice place to be…but I would ask the family of Dante Lewis “what did you do to avert this? Did you ever tell your brother to put down the gun, not to commit crimes of violence? Did you tell police that he had an illegal weapon, so that this tragedy for all could be averted?
   I think not.

4. posted by David at May 16, 2008 8:17 am :
   

   My typing sucks.

5. posted by nadine at May 16, 2008 10:41 am :
   

   Taneqwa - As we mature (IF we mature), we learn that we must take individual responsibility for our actions and understand the consequences for these actions. I know you are hurt, but the only person you can blame for this is your brother. He is SOLEY responsible.

6. posted by tyler at May 16, 2008 10:22 pm :
   

   are you on drugs

7. posted by JC at May 17, 2008 10:00 pm :
   

   tyler, are you that insensitive? it is obvious that taneqwa is hurt and upset and your comment not at all helpful.

   i feel for you and your family, taneqwa. please look for something positive in all this pain and suffering you are going through. maybe you can, in your unique position, help to discourage such senseless acts of violence in the future.

8. posted by linda at June 7, 2008 12:05 am :
   

   I am Dante and Taneqwa’s grandmother. I feel I must respond to some of the comments presented here. Dante was a wonderful child growing up, full of laughter and surprises. He was never a disrespectful child and gave me a lot of joy. Yes, Dante was convicted of a crime (not sure if the crime was committed alone or even if he committed the crime)and was given a substantial amount of time. I agree with Taneqwa, he got too much time. We can do everything we can as parents/grandparents but peer pressure is something we can not compete with. The law is on the side of the child, therefore when control is lost, what can a parent do? Many years ago, parents were able to discipline their child without the fear of incarceration. Now days parents live in fear of their children. I am not saying we lived in fear of Dante because we didn’t, there was never any indication that Dante was involved in anything illegal. My concern was the type of friends he decided to hang around with. I will admit now as I did back then, his friend Gregory in my opinion have always been bad news. It is my belief that Gregory was with Dante the night the icecream crime went down! Was Gregory charged? …absolutely not but if the police did their job without being so quick to get Dante off the street, they probably would have found evidence that Greg was right their on the scene. The police did not think about the gun that Greg had and used during the carwash robbery. I bet if they find the gun, it would probably be the same gun used in the icecream robbery!

9. posted by ebony lewis at June 7, 2008 1:09 pm :
   

   i have some comments 2 make about this as well…Im ebony as u can see my name i am Dante baby sister i am only 16yrs old n i feel the same way as my sister and my Grandmother do because on December 1st of 2006 my best friend Robert Lewis was kill and that guy got 30yrs the same as my brother Dante did but the diffrence is my brother did not kill any 1 you people make my brotha look like a hard core killer but my brother wouldnt hurt anybody or anything yes i can say if it came down 2 fighting he would but tryning 2 kill someone n hurt them he would neva n his life do anything like that.. me n my brother is like best friends i tell him everything n he tell me everything but all that time they gave him was uncalled for who can i talk 2 now when i have my problems at home not him cause look where he is n a hell hole where u have 2 b told when u can n can not do some thing! i talked 2 my brother just not 2 long ago on the phone n he sound so down n not being his self my bother is always a happy person n love 2 make other people smile n when i was on the phone i cryed because thats not like my brother he didnt even say a joke or anything n i felt as if he just think his life is over n he may do feel like that because he will never get married have any kids because look where he is.. n his girlfriend Tiarra is going thu the same thing we r cause they been together so long.. all i have 2 say u people dont know my brother so u cant judge its book by its cover n thats something my mother n my grandmother told all of me n my sisters n brothers n i stuck with it.. n 2 tyler who asked was my sister on drugs naw she just sick of stupid people like u!.. but thank you 2 JC because you understand what our family is going thu right now…..

10. posted by Jennifer C. at June 7, 2008 2:35 pm :
    

    Linda and Ebony:
    This is an awful time for your family. We don’t have the advantage of having known Dante for a lifetime, so it’s less personal for us. Whether or not both boys were equally culpable, they were both there, in a school parking lot, with a gun. All we see is that a man who was working in an ice cream truck was shot in a parking lot full of people. Yes, teenagers do stupid things all the time - but most of the time, they don’t nearly kill innocent people. That’s when the sympathy level goes way down.
    As for this:
    

    It is my belief that Gregory was with Dante the night the icecream crime went down!

    If he wasn’t the one who pulled the trigger and the person who did hasn’t been charged, then I hope that you will beat down the door of every lawyer in town until he is. I’m also curious as to whether your grandson says he was there or not.
    I don’t want to hear “He was a good boy,” about someone who shoots somebody else. Shooting someone intentionally is not a “mistake.”

11. posted by ps at June 8, 2008 2:24 pm :
    

    For the Lewis family, I am so sorry for what you are going through, I can’t imagine having a member of my family commit such a senseless, heinous crime. Please keep the victim of this crime in your prayers, had he died as a result of the gunshot wound inflicted on him by your brother/grandson, his family would be devastated beyond anything you could ever feel with your family member locked away for 30 years because death is permanent and irreversible. Your brother/grandson is alive and you can still talk to him, he is just in a place were people go when they commit senseless heinous crimes. How is it that you don’t think pumping a bullet into another human being is not cold-blooded? Do you realize there is no difference between a bullet that kills and a bullet that injures? The only reason Dante is not a murderer is by the grace of God who allowed Dante’s victim to live in spite of someone pumping a bullet into him!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

12. posted by ebony lewis at June 8, 2008 2:30 pm :
    

    well it dont matter if it was a mistake or not we not sayin my brotha is a goodie 2 shoe all we sayin is we knw him better then that n i knw my mother tough us sum thing better then 2 go around hurtin people n like i said b4 u people cant judge itz book by its cover! n we knw both of them very well 2 knw who will do wat n greg he will hurt sum 1 ova a pice of candy yes i knw i’ve kwn him 4 a while 2 knw what he wil do so dnt come on here n say sum u dnt knw wat u talkin about datz da way i feel about it n like i said b4 u people look @ him like he a hard core killer but if dat man that was n that ice cream truck was black u people whold hve not said nothin or did nothin 2 help him cause dats how yal people r these days yal dnt care bout people 4 real cause if yal did yal would thank about how people family wil feel first yea i knw that man peoples was hurt but he still goin on with his life when i seen him on the news he looked fine 2 me!… n wat my brotha got 30yrs 4 sum yal dnt even knw if he did or not cuz yal dnt hve nothin on him but he wus there wat if i said i was there wat wil yal do give me 30yrs?… n i thank yal need 2 do yal job n look 4 the right stuff cause like my grandmother said if they look 4 the gun that was used 4 the car wash robbery yal wil who did it just cause yal not doin yal job right dnt put it on my brother n thats another thing my mother n grandmother said stand up 4 wat u knw is right or wrong n this whole thing with my brother is wrong cause like i said i knw my brother better then that!!!!!….

13. posted by Jennifer C. at June 8, 2008 7:56 pm :
    

    Okay, I went back and reread the original article, which includes this:

    Lewis has an extensive criminal record of violent crimes, including another aggravated malicious wounding conviction in 2005. Lewis had just been released after serving half of his five-year term for that conviction three months before Teodorescu’s shooting.

    I think that might have something to do with the sentence he got - the time he served apparently wasn’t much of a deterrent. He must have committed the first offense before he was old enough to drive.
    As for us “doing our jobs,” what would you like us, as a community, to do for people like your brother? Let him out in another three years so he can shoot someone else? I really don’t care what color the victim was, and the degree of injury really doesn’t matter either. I do care that someone who has a history of hurting other people for no reason put a bullet in him. Your brother was not catching a ride from his Boy Scout meeting with a criminal. He was out looking for trouble.

14. posted by Taneqwa Lewis at June 10, 2008 1:05 am :
    

    First of all, to Jennifer C, you said you dont want to hear that he was a good boy, you didnt know him when he was younger did you NO YOU DIDNT and a child can grow up and be so innocent but once that child get old enough to make their own decisions, they will do whatever they please, majority of the mass murderers was innocent children and they just grow up to do the things they do, so you dont have to believe that he was a good boy; BUT HE WAS!!! And to everybody that had posted a comment about him shooting the ice cream vendor, non of yall actually knows if he shot him or not, yall just going by what the media says; and as far as im concern the media over-exaggerates; they have a tendency of stretching the truth.. AND NO I AM NOT JUST SAYING THIS BECAUSE I THINK THAT MY BROTHER SHOULDNT BE SENTENCED, BECAUSE HE SHOULD FOR BEING INVOLVED… but everybody cant say something if they dont know nothing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

15. posted by David at June 10, 2008 9:43 am :
    

    Maybe everyone ought to drop this chain. It’s just brining pain to everyone and closure to no-one.

16. posted by Barbara B. at June 12, 2008 4:52 am :
    

    From a close friend of the family TO David you mint be right on what you said but we not gone stop speaking our minds until we is hared out 2 everyone that we not say he is inocent he just shouldn’t have got all that time for some thing he didn’t do even the Icecream men said that it wasn’t Dante who did it but yet he tell got sentence 30yrs which is to much time for something he didn’t do. yea he mint have been there he still could have got less time then that at lease 15 to 20year but 30 that out of the question. the system is real mess up right now cause how u gone 2 people the same sentence for different crime that just stupid.in if the icecream men was at home around the time they said he was out there he went have to worry about it. in to me the icecream men sound pretty o.k to me it aint like he can’t talk cause he could when he was on the news he talking pretty GOOD!!!!!

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