Sentencing hearings are scheduled for Indiana County’s Court of Common Pleas today, including one for a man who pleaded guilty to charges related to a fatal crash in January of this year.
Police say 29-year-old Elias Lopez Jimenez of Indiana was the driver of a car that went the wrong way on Route 119 South near the intersection of Lucerne Road and collided nearly head-on with a vehicle driven by 30-year-old Christopher Sipes of Greensburg. A 30-year-old Jeanette man, who was in the backseat and wearing a seatbelt at the time, was killed in the crash. Police found footprints leading from the scene to the Hoodlebug Trail. They followed the prints to the parking lot of the Quality Inn hotel on Wayne Avenue and found him hiding under a bed inside the hotel.
On August 1st, Jimenez pleaded guilty to charges of accidents involving death or personal injury and homicide by vehicle. Other charges of accidents involving death or injury by a driver without a license and summary driving charges were not prosecuted.
Also due for sentencing today is 39-year-old Dennis Dale Lewis, Jr. of Indiana, who pleaded guilty in one case to resisting arrest and criminal mischief for an incident on August 11th of 2022. He was seen by police in the 400 block of Philadelphia Street and at the time had warrants out from both Indiana and Cambria Counties. When police asked him to stop, he fled, and resisted arrest when officers took him into custody. In another case, Lewis pleaded guilty to theft by deception for incidents investigated in January of last year. As part of the plea deal, 18 counts of bad checks were not prosecuted.
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