Washington Court House man faces over a decade in prison after pleading guilty to charges in Highland, Clermont, Warren counties
A Washington Court House man already serving prison sentences from two other counties has been sentenced to another five years in connection with a Highland County burglary case.
As previously reported, Christopher Spencer, 29, was indicted by a Highland County grand jury in March 2022.
The indictment alleged that on or about April 26, 2021, Spencer “did by force, stealth or deception knowingly trespass in an occupied structure, or in a separately secured or separately occupied portion of an occupied structure” when the property owner “or any person other than an accomplice of the offender is present or likely to be present, with purpose to commit in the habitation a criminal offense.” Spencer was accused of taking a Ford Fairmount and other miscellaneous items.
In addition, Spencer was also accused of “knowingly receiving, retaining or disposing of” a 9 mm handgun owned by a separate victim, while Spencer allegedly “knew or had reasonable cause to believe” the gun “had been obtained through the commission of a theft offense.”
Spencer pleaded guilty July 27 to burglary, grand theft of a motor vehicle and receiving stolen property, with the breaking and entering charge dismissed.
According to a bill of particulars, the first two victims in this case reported that their vehicle had been stolen and that both their residence and camper had been broken into. Left behind at the scene was a backpack containing a handgun, which was found to belong to the third victim. That victim reported that the handgun and backpack had been left inside a truck that had also been stolen.
In August 2021, a Goshen police officer interviewed Spencer, who allegedly admitted that he had taken the third victim’s truck “from Loveland and crashed it in Highland County,” then “spent the night” in the first two victims’ camper and took food from their house. He then drove away from the property in the first two victims’ vehicle.
Since that incident, Spencer has been convicted in five separate Clermont County cases, including on charges of aggravated possession of drugs, a third-degree felony; five counts of counterfeiting, a fourth-degree felony, from two different cases; grand theft of a motor vehicle, a fourth-degree felony; and attempted grand theft of a motor vehicle, a fifth-degree felony. He was also convicted of receiving stolen property, a fourth-degree felony, in two different Warren County cases. According to the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction, Spencer had been sentenced to a total of four years and 11 months in prison from those combined cases.
After accepting Spencer’s guilty pleas, Highland County Common Pleas Court Judge Rocky Coss sentenced Spencer to a minimum of four years on the burglary charge (maximum of six years, under the Reagan Tokes Law), consecutive to nine months on the grand theft of a motor vehicle charge and six months for receiving stolen property. Those counts are to run consecutively to Spencer’s already imposed sentence, for a total of 10 years and two months in prison.