ELKHART COUNTY COURTS: Nappanee murder suspect has initial hearing

Mar. 28—GOSHEN — A Nappanee woman charged with murdering of her husband had an initial hearing Thursday.

According to a probable cause affidavit, Linda Tener, 70, shot her husband, Johnnie Tener, 71, at their son's home in the 72000 block of C.R. 9 Friday.

The call came in to police around 4:50 a.m. Her daughter-in-law contacted police to warn them that Tener was pointing a firearm at her son, Eric. Eric reportedly wrestled the gun away from Linda Tener and pinned her down.

Police also said Tener told Eric repeatedly that she had hurt Dad.

"Your dad is dead," she allegedly said. "I shot him."

On scene, officers found a pink revolver and went to the Tener's nearby home in the 71000 block of C.R. 9 where they found Johnnie Tener deceased in a recliner with one apparent gunshot wound.

Eric told police that his mother had recently been hospitalized and treated for anxiety the day prior. When he dropped his mom off at the house after she was released from the hospital Thursday evening, he didn't notice any hostility between his parents.

During her initial hearing, Tener was provided a public defender. She has a pretrial conference scheduled for April 25, omnibus date May 3, trial status conference scheduled for Nov. 7, and her jury trial is set for Dec. 2.

DIETRICH J. PERKINS, Jr.

A man arrested on a charge of possession of a machine gun last week had an initial hearing Thursday in Elkhart County Circuit Court.

According to a probable cause affidavit, Dietrich J. Perkins, 25, Elkhart, was initially pulled over by Elkhart police at 10:18 p.m. March 20 near Prairie Street and Middlebury Street for not having tail lights on his vehicle.

The officer, after smelling marijuana, asked him to exit his vehicle. Perkins allegedly questioned the order and the officer claimed Perkins "kept asking to reach down toward the flood board where he advised that he had dropped his phone," the officer wrote in a probable cause affidavit.

The officer refused and continued to ask him to step out of the vehicle and he obliged.

Officers found a 9mm handgun with a magazine inserted in the console. The gun had a Glock switch, a device used to effectively make a semi-automatic pistol a fully automatic weapon or machine gun.

While the officers did confirm a phone had fallen onto the floor boards, Perkins told officers he was hesitant to exit the vehicle due to the weapon being in the car, but told police that he'd recently traded another firearm for the Glock 17, and didn't know if it anything about it being illegal to possess.

During his initial hearing, Perkins told the judge that he intends to hire his private counsel. Perkins' trial status conference is scheduled for April 25, omnibus date is May 23, trial status conference is Nov. 7, and a jury trial is currently scheduled for Dec. 2.

KYRIE E. BRENNEMAN

Due to a busy schedule, doctors haven't been able to have the fourth insanity evaluation on Kyrie E. Brenneman, 30, Goshen ,who is charged with multiple counts of child neglect and battery toward her 3-month-old daughter.

Results from previous competency evaluations have had split results.

Brenneman is charged with two counts of Neglect of a Dependent Resulting in Catastrophic Injury on Sept. 29, and six counts of Domestic Battery with Serious Bodily Injury to a Person Under 14 June 24.

According to a probable cause affidavit, doctors at Goshen Hospital contacted police to investigate a possible child abuse after a baby was brought in with brain bleeding Sept. 29. The three-month-old baby girl suffered a skull fracture, brain bleeding, and seizures, and was ultimately flown to Riley Children's Hospital for treatment.

Elkhart County Homicide Unit was also called in for the investigation as at the time, doctors weren't sure if the girl would survive.

Brenneman and her boyfriend told police during questioning that the baby's dad, her boyfriend, had been caring for the child and accidentally dropped her on her head on the changing table. The boyfriend later told police it was a lie and said they made up the story together so Brenneman wouldn't have to go to jail.

He told police that Brenneman told him that she dropped the baby and shook her and then took her to the hospital. When questioned, Brenneman then said that it was she who dropped the baby on the changing table on Sept. 28 and that she shook her because she would not stop crying, and also squeezed her in her arms.

After the baby stopped crying, she put the baby in her crib and went to bed and didn't check on her again until her boyfriend got home from work around 3 p.m. and he noticed the child wasn't acting 'like herself.'

The next morning, Sept. 29, the couple found blood on the crib and changing table but couldn't find any cuts on the baby so they thought the blood came from her mouth and took to her the hospital when her arm began twitching and possibly having seizures.

Brenneman allegedly told police that she'd dropped, squeezed, chucked, shook, or smacked the baby before out of frustration because her crying kept her awake, between June 24 and Sept. 28. The charges dated June 24 are a result of those claims.

The competency hearing was reset for April 11, when the pretrial conference was already scheduled.

FREDDIE DARNELL RHODES, JR.

A man sentenced to 58 years for his part in a murder after a robbery gone sideways is returning to Elkhart County Circuit Court for Post-Conviction Relief. Attorneys met for a status conference on Thursday, and Defense Attorney Mark S. Koselke asked for another conference Oct. 3 as they prepare for the possibility of a new trial.

A jury trial found Freddie Darnell Rhodes, Jr., now 28, guilty in the murder of in July 2015. Police say he, Dretarrius Rodgers, 18, and Deante Dalton, 16, broke into a home in the 22000 block of Falcon Court in Goshen Sept. 10, 2014, for a robbery.

A resident of the home had said she and her boyfriend were asleep in a basement bedroom when two men kicked in the bedroom door and came in with guns. The resident recognized Rhodes, despite coverings over each of their mouths, who demanded her boyfriend show them what to take. The man led the men out of the room and a struggle for the gun ensued. The gun held by Rodgers went off several times and Rhodes ran up the stairs. The woman said she saw another man she didn't know and also ran up the stairs along with Rhodes and two men fled the house.

When police arrived, they found Rodgers dead at the foot of the basement stairs and bullet casings leading down to him. They also found bullet holes in the siding and a front window.

The woman's boyfriend was also hospitalized after being shot four times.

Rhodes told police that there were four men involved and he was the only one without a gun, but the woman claimed he did have one. Rhodes told police it was predetermined that Rodgers and he would go to the basement where drugs and money were presumed to be stored, while a fourth man waited outside and Dalton stayed upstairs.

Rhodes also told police that due to the physical struggle over the gun, several shots were fired from it, striking both men, and that as he and Dalton left the house, Dalton fired several rounds toward the front of the home where the woman was standing, and left the other two men behind.

Dalton denied the fourth man being in attendance at the robbery at all, where they left with only a laptop, and told police, it was Rhodes who shot at the front of the house several times.

At sentencing, Rhodes' attorney Douglas Grimes told Judge Terry Shewmaker that the ruling was unconstitutional, claiming that Rhodes didn't, "murder anybody, didn't rob anybody, he didn't have a gun."

"You put many in danger and the act of one is the act of all — you could have left when it went 'South' but you chose not to leave," Shewmaker told Rhodes. "You were an adult leading Dalton, who was a juvenile, in and out of the event."

JARROD ADAM SPIGUTZ

A man sentenced to over 60 years for an Elkhart shooting is also undergoing post-conviction relief, according to his attorney.

Jarrod Adam Spigutz, now 25, Bristol, was sentenced in Feb. 2018 for the murder of Jared Foltz, 20, Elkhart. Spigutz allegedly shot and killed Foltz during a marijuana deal gone wrong in the Menards parking lot, 601 E. Windsor Savenue May 28, 2017. Police say Spigutz fired shots at Foltz while the two were sitting in his Jeep.

Spigutz's attorney Jay M. Lee also requested a further status conference as they pursue litigations, scheduled for Oct. 3.

EDWARD L. PERRY

A man was sentenced to a year at the Indiana Department of Corrections and a total of two years on reporting probation in the Elkhart County Superior Court 3 Thursday after being arrested for allegedly attempting to cash a fraudulent check last fall.

Edward L. Perry was sentenced on charges of Failure to Return, Possession of Cocaine, Attempted Counterfeiting, all Level 6 Felonies.

Police were called to Everwise Credit Union, 4574 Elkhart Road, Goshen Sept. 13 for an attempted cashing of a fraudulent check.

The man, Edward L. Perry, had allegedly attempted to cash a check by a woman for "roofing" at $8,500. The bank teller had compared the check to other checks written by the woman and determined the handwriting was very different and contacted the woman to confirm she'd written it but she said she hadn't and in fact lives in an apartment and couldn't have needed to pay for a roofing job. She confirmed that she was missing several checks.

Police learned during their investigation that Perry was friends with a man who was employed by the home healthcare organization that provided services to the woman at her apartment.

Perry had also been arrested for possession of cocaine and resisting law enforcement, and driving while suspended, his public defender Christopher Crawford claiming the many incurred charges in Elkhart between September and December, were in large part a result of recent deaths in his family and poor mental health.

"I don't mean to see heartless but bad stuff happens all the time," Elkhart County Superior Court 3 Judge Teresa Cataldo said, "and people blame their bad behavior on circumstances in their life. There are plenty of people that people that are dear to them pass away, unfortunate accidents, acts of other people, but they don't go into this spiral of activity."

GABRIALA PETERS

A teen associated with a robbery, assault and battery from an incident where three girls ran away from Bashor Children's Home in October 2022 was given some leniency by Judge Christofeno.

According to police, Gabriala Peter, Nimaoni King, and another teen ran away from Bashor Oct. 10, 2022. In the course of their escape, they allegedly assaulted a staff member and stole her building keys to escape.

Later that day, officers were advised of three young women running on properties near C.R. 30 and C.R. 15, and they were apprehended — although two of them attempted to resist law enforcement, police said.

King was sentenced to 14 years in May.

Peters was released on bond in May and has received two additional charges since — leaving home without permission of a guardian and institutional criminal mischief in Wayne County. Earlier in the year, public defender Christopher Petersen asked the judge for leniency and explained that Peters had suffered sex traffic abuse and trauma, alleging that the criminal acts were a result of acting out from the past trauma, adding that Peters is now living with her parents, in treatment, has a social worker, is in school set to graduate early, and her parents are working to get her into residential treatment.

Indiana Legal Services attorney Malorie Palmer on Thursday explained that Peters' attorneys are looking for placement options for her as she finishes high school and begins a road to recovery. Palmer explained that some of the facilities have denied her due to her not being homeless, having a unique set of struggles and traumas, or simply not having the necessary paperwork to proceed.

Prosecuting Attorney Petersen said the state has intentions to listen to the behest of Peters' attorneys and continue her progress.

"I would encourage Ms. Peters to take advantage of this rare opportunity," he said.

Elkhart County Circuit Judge Michael Christofeno did not issue an order on the state's request to revoke bond.

Peters now has a status conference update scheduled for May 30, and her jury trial remains scheduled for Sept. 29.