News

November 11

Thief gets 4- to 8-year sentence

Jonathan Michael Kemmerer, Nanticoke, had admitted to dozen charges stemming from 5 incidents.

By Sheena Delazio sdelazio@timesleader.com
Staff Writer
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WILKES-BARRE – A Nanticoke man was sentenced Thursday to four to eight years in state prison on a dozen charges stemming from five incidents, including burglaries at Moon Lake Park in Plymouth Township.

Luzerne County Senior Judge Hugh Mundy sentenced Jonathan Michael Kemmerer, 27, of East Broad Street, on two counts of robbery; three counts of criminal trespassing; four counts of theft by unlawful taking; two counts of criminal mischief, and one count of possessing an instrument of crime.

Kemmerer pleaded guilty to the charges in October.

According to court papers:

On Jan. 28, Kemmerer robbed the Cocoa Hut on East Main Street in Nanticoke, telling a clerk he had a gun.

Kemmerer took an undetermined amount of cash and left the store. A surveillance video captured the robbery, and Kemmerer was identified as the suspect. On Jan. 1, Kemmerer burglarized a Broad Street, Nanticoke, residence and took copper piping.

That same month, Kemmerer and another man burglarized Moon Lake Park along state Route 29, owned by Luzerne County Parks and Recreation Department, two separate times.

Aluminum dividers and copper piping were stolen in the incidents.

Most recently, on June 24, Kemmerer walked into Shelly’s Pizza on Carey Avenue in Hanover Township and asked to use the bathroom.

When he left the bathroom, he approached the counter and told the clerk he had a gun and wanted money.

About $330 was taken, and Kemmerer fled. He later told investigators he spent the money on cocaine and that he committed the robbery because of a drug addiction.

Mundy ordered Kemmerer to pay $3,074 in restitution and said Kemmerer will receive 35 days credit for time already served in prison.

Assistant District Attorney Albert Yacoub prosecuted the case. Kemmerer was represented by attorney Thomas Cometa.

Cometa filed a request to modify Kemmerer’s sentence shortly after his hearing Thursday, asking that all of Kemmerer’s sentences run concurrent to each other for a total of 18 to 36 months in prison.

Cometa said his client has been drug-free since his arrest and he has accepted responsibility for his actions by pleading guilty.

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