Attorney: ‘Pull of heroin’ led to crime for Delaware man

John Carrow Hicks of Bear, Del. sentenced for burglaries in Chester County

WEST CHESTER » A lifetime of substance abuse by a Delaware man led to a lifetime of crime, including two home burglaries in Chester County for which he has been sentenced.

“I am convinced your conduct here was generated by your drug addiction,” Common PLeas Judge David Bortner told defendant John Carrow Hicks during the sentencing hearing on Wednesday, at which Bortner ordered him incarcerated for five to 10 years at a state correctional facility.

“But that doesn’t matter for the victims of these crimes,” Bortner told the 30-year-old Bear, Del., resident, adding that Hicks had previous convictions for theft, assault, firearms violations, and drug possession, and had been in and out of treatment programs — yet continued to use drugs and commit crimes. “As long as you are in jail, the court has some assurance that you wont be breaking into anyone’s house.”

Hicks was arrested by an investigator from the Westtown-East Goshen Regional Police Department in January 2017, after he and his twin sister were tied to the two burglaries that occurred in December 2016. Taken was jewelry that was later found pawned at a pawn shop in Delaware.

One of the victims — who had surprised Hicks as he was in her kitchen, going through her purse

— wrote a statement that prosecutor Assistant District Attorney Caitlin Rice read for Bortner. In it, she said she still fears finding a burglar in her home. “I’m nervous and afraid,” the woman wrote. “I cannot relax or enjoy myself.”

Hicks’ attorney, Alex Silow of West Chester, said his client had cooperated with police and authorities after his arrest, waiving a preliminary hearing, pleading guilty, and sparing the victims of his burglaries the trauma of having to testify in court. And he stressed for Bortner the toll that Hicks’ substance abuse had wreaked on his life.

“The pull of heroin is just god-awful,” Silow said in asking Bortner to show leniency by running his sentences on the two crimes concurrently, rather than back-to-back as Rice requested. “It makes people do things that they might not otherwise do.” That was Hicks’ story; letters from his family called him a person who would do anything to help someone else out, except for when he was using drugs.

“This is not a person who needs to be warehoused for a prolonged period of time,” Silow said of his client.

According to Bortner’s description of Hicks’ life, he was born with a twin to a teenage mother who found it impossible to raise her kids on her own, and an absentee father. His grandparents, who took him in, were also incapable of providing a stable home life, his grandfather suffering from suicidal impulses himself. Hicks began drinking alcohol at 10 years of age, and using marijuana at 13. His juvenile record was almost as long as his adult criminal history.

Hicks apologized for his actions, and said that he had begun now

to take control of his life after spending the past 15 months in Chester County Prison. “Stuff I lost I want to gain back now,” he said, noting the influence drugs had had on his life. “I feel alive now.”

According to the criminal complaint against him, the burglaries Hicks admitted to occurred on Dec. 20 and Dec. 21, 2016.

In the first instance, a homeowner in the 1600 block of East Strasburg Road in East Goshen reported discovering a break-in and the loss of several items of jewelry, with an estimated value of $10,949. In the second, the homeowner said she arrived at her South Concord Road house around 2 p.m. to find a man in her kitchen. He ran from the home, and was seen driving away in a car with Delaware registration.

WEGO Detective Russell Weaverling wrote that he was able to get surveillance video of a car with Delaware plates in the neighborhood at the time, and track that car to Hicks’ sister, Bobbie Jo Hicks. He was also able to learn that she had sold items to Northeast Gold and Coin in December 2016.

A review of records at the pawn shop matched items that had been reported taken in the burglary on East Strasburg Road.

When Hicks and his sister were apprehended in Elkton, Md., in January 2017, they both gave statements confessing to the crimes. Hicks said he still had a number of the stolen items from the Strasburg Road home.

Bobbi Jo Hicks pleaded guilty earlier and was sentenced to probation, largely because she was not found to have entered the homes, but merely served as the driver and person who pawned the items.

To contact staff writer Micael P. Rellahan call 610-696-1544.