Men plead guilty to paralyzing woman
Two men involved in a gangrelated shooting that left a woman paralyzed seven years ago pleaded guilty Monday in Franklin County Common Pleas Court.
Drakkar Groce and William R. Griffin, both 26, pleaded guilty to felonious assault and drug charges in the wounding of Alexandria “Alix” Reese.
Reese, now 32, was lost and driving on Atchison Street approaching Trevitt Street on the Near East Side about 11:30 p.m. on May 27, 2010, when she drove into the middle of
gunfire. A bullet pierced her neck and severed her spine. She was left a quadriplegic with no motor control below her neck.
“She just happened to drive right through the middle of the firing,” Assistant Prosecutor Dan Hogan told visiting Judge John F. Bender.
A friend Reese was taking to a boyfriend’s home who was sitting in the front passenger seat was unharmed.
Police recovered 18 shell casings from a Glock semiautomatic pistol at the scene, Hogan said. He said Groce was firing across the street at a man he thought had fired at him from a car earlier.
Hogan said a witness told investigators she saw both Groce and Griffin firing guns. The guns were never recovered.
In a plea agreement with defense attorneys, prosecutors plan to seek an eight-year prison term for Groce when he is sentenced Dec. 20, Hogan said. On the same day, he is scheduled to be sentenced to at least a mandatory minimum 12 years in prison for an unrelated drug-racketeering charge.
Groce was identified as a member of the Greenway Bloods, Hogan said. The drug gang reportedly claims turf on the Near East Side through which Greenway Avenue runs east-west.
A jury in May convicted Groce and two accomplices of manufacturing, possessing and trafficking in cocaine. The jury saw video footage from the group’s own surveillance cameras inside a duplex in the 1600 block of Greenway. It showed the defendants cooking, processing, packaging and selling crack cocaine.
On Monday, Judge Bender sentenced Griffin to two years in prison. From that will be subtracted 430 days he has spent in jail awaiting the disposition of his case.
As part of the deal, prosecutors agreed not to pursue a homicide charge against either man if Reese dies and her death is attributed to her bullet wound.
Hogan said Reese and her family agreed to the sentences.
The family declined to comment on Reese’s condition until the sentencing in December.