Man convicted in crime spree that included two near-fatal beatings has been sentenced
He nearly beat a Gig Harbor man to death, committed a drive-by shooting and later stomped on the head of a fellow inmate at Pierce County Jail, inflicting serious injuries.
Now, 25-year-old Samuel Elijah Stacy has been sentenced to decades in prison for that string of crimes, committed in 2020 not long after he was released from the Nisqually Jail in Thurston County, court records show. In all, he’s been sentenced to 37 years, 9 months for convictions in two counties.
Stacy was sentenced Friday in Pierce County Superior Court to four years for the Oct. 2, 2020, attack on the Gig Harbor man. Stacy pleaded guilty June 16 to second-degree assault — down from attempted murder — and charges of first-degree assault, burglary and trafficking in stolen property were dismissed as part of a plea agreement. Prosecutors wrote in court filings that it was a “very circumstantial” case that would have been difficult to prove and that the plea agreement took into account Stacy’s sentence in his other assault case.
According to court records, the assault was one of the first offenses Stacy committed in the days after he was released from Nisqually Jail on Oct. 1, 2020. A former jail mate picked him up, and the next night the two went to a 67-year-old man’s home on Key Peninsula and used a bat to attack him, crushing several bones and injuring his brain while ransacking the house.
Stacy’s co-defendant, Taylor Miles, 29, pleaded guilty last month to second-degree manslaughter and trafficking in stolen property. He’s to be sentenced July 21, and he faces a sentencing range of nine to 10 years in prison
The week after the burglary and assault, Stacy was arrested in Kitsap County for drive-by shooting following reports of gunfire from a vehicle. The driver of the car he was in was chased by police and crashed, and Stacy was taken into custody. According to the Kitsap County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, he was sentenced Nov. 9, 2020, to 7 years in prison for drive-by shooting, attempting to elude a pursuing police vehicle and first-degree unlawful possession of a firearm.
Charges in the Gig Harbor assault were brought against Stacy while he was serving that sentence at a prison in southeast Washington, and he was transferred to Pierce County Jail while the case was prosecuted, court records show. Several months into his incarceration there, he beat another inmate unconscious and stomped on his head several times. He was convicted of first-degree assault in a jury trial earlier this month, and on June 9 Judge Grant Blinn sentenced him to 26-and-a-half years.
Victim’s bones crushed with bat
The victim in the burglary lived next to a family-owned business he managed, according to court records, and he was found the morning after lying on a bathroom floor by an employee and his sister-in-law when he didn’t answer his phone.
The man’s niece wrote in a statement to the court that her uncle died and was resuscitated by CPR. Records state he suffered a traumatic brain injury, fractured sinuses, crushed bones in his nose and cheeks, as well as significant bruising to his hips and chest. The relative said her uncle was in a coma for six weeks, his eyesight was affected, he had to relearn how to walk, talk and swallow and he underwent multiple surgeries, including for his heart.
“[He] cannot take care of himself anymore and will likely never be able to again,” she wrote in March 2021.
Investigators from the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department found a bloody bat believed to have been used in the beating, according to the declaration for determination of probable cause, and there was evidence indicating that someone had tried to clean up puddles of blood left in the house with bleach.
An anonymous tip led detectives to Stacy and Miles, and cell phone records later placed Miles at the victim’s home for about four hours on the night of the burglary. Detectives also found two different shoe prints, one of which was linked to Stacy.
Defendant arrested after drive-by, police pursuit
Investigators believe Stacy was the passenger in a maroon Dodge Charger from which shots were fired at another vehicle Oct. 9, 2020, while driving through Bremerton on state Route 3, according to court records and media reports.
Police pursued the car and the occupants bailed out in the opposite lanes of traffic on state Route 3, the Kitsap Sun reported.
Court records say a police dog led officers to Stacy. Inside the car, detectives reportedly found a wallet taken in the burglary of the Gig Harbor man and stolen property from a burglary in Olalla. According to the probable cause document, that burglary involved two male suspects, one of whom was armed with a knife, entering a house Oct. 7 and stealing multiple items.
Inmate slammed into ground
The assault Stacy was convicted of while his burglary case was prosecuted was also severe. According to charging documents, a witness saw him pick up a 36-year-old inmate by the waist, flip him upside down and slam him into the concrete floor, then stomp on his head.
The witness reportedly saw inmates looking at the victim’s court paperwork before the beating, and he said he believed Stacy attacked him because of the victim’s crimes. Court records state the victim was in jail on suspicion of motor vehicle theft, but he has prior convictions for failure to register as a sex offender and a 2002 conviction for first-degree child rape.
A corrections officer saw Stacy punching the man, who was on the floor, in the head, according to the probable cause document. The officer reportedly yelled at him to stop, but Stacy started stomping on the man’s head until more officers arrived.
The victim was transported to a hospital, and he remained intubated almost two weeks later with a brain bleed. In a statement made to the court in January, the man’s brother said the victim still required constant attention and would likely never live independently again.
