Pottstown man sentenced for illegal gun possession
NORRISTOWN » A Pottstown man faces up to five years of court supervision after he admitted to illegally possessing a handgun in the borough.
Elijah R. Williams, 39, of the 100 block of North Washington Street, was sentenced in Montgomery County Court to 11½ to 23 months in the county jail after he pleaded guilty to a felony charge of person not to possess firearms in connection with the December 2020 incident. Williams will receive credit for 351 days he spent in jail since June 2021 while awaiting court action on the charge, according to court records.
Judge Thomas M. DelRicci said Williams also must complete three years’ probation following parole, meaning he will be under court supervision for about five years.
With the charge, prosecutors alleged Williams had a prior criminal record that prohibited him from possessing a firearm.
The Glock 17 semiautomatic pistol possessed by Williams must be forfeited to county detectives, the judge said.
An investigation began on Dec. 7, 2020, when borough police on routine patrol observed a disturbance between several men at Franklin and Chestnut streets and saw what appeared to be a handgun in Williams’s right hand, according to a criminal complaint filed by Pottstown Police Officer John Schmalbach.
“I made eye contact with him and he moved to conceal his right hand behind his body,” Schmalbach alleged, adding he exited the patrol vehicle and attempted to make contact with Williams. “At this time, the defendant began to run westbound on Chestnut towards Evans. I gave chase, radioed these facts with a caution to other officers that I believed the defendant to be armed.”
Williams eventually was detained several blocks away. Officers then “back tracked” along the
path Williams took as he fled. An officer found a black Glock
17 semiautomatic pistol in a side yard of a residence in the 300 block of Chestnut Street, which was directly along the path taken by Williams, according to the criminal complaint. “I recovered the weapon and the metal
slide was warm to the touch,” Schmalbach alleged.
A background check determined Williams’s criminal history showed convictions or guilty pleas for aggravated assault and robbery of a motor vehicle from New Jersey, which prohibited Williams from possessing a firearm, police alleged in the criminal complaint.
“Additionally, the serial numbers on the firearm had been obliterated,” Schmalbach alleged. Other charges of altering or obliterating marks of identification and disorderly conduct were dismissed against Williams in exchange for his guilty plea to the felony gun charge.