Trending Topics

Wash. inmate, who assaulted a CO, attacks lawyer in court

Jose Pedro Linares was found guilty earlier this month of punching a CO in the head repeatedly as he was returning his lunch tray in 2016

By Donald W. Meyers
Yakima Herald

YAKIMA, Wash. — A 27-year-old Sunnyside man’s sentencing in a jail assault was rescheduled for today after authorities say he attacked his attorney in Yakima County Superior Court last week.

Jose Pedro Linares was to have been sentenced Friday, but he kicked defense attorney David Therrien-Power in the lower leg at the start of the hearing, said Scott Himes, Yakima County jail security operations chief.

Linares was restrained by corrections officers and the hearing was rescheduled, Himes said. Court records show no charges filed against Linares in the incident as of Tuesday.

Attempts to contact Therrien-Power and Holai Holbrook, the prosecutor handling the case, were not successful.

It was not the first time Linares has been involved in an attack in the jail’s basement courtroom. In March 2016, another inmate attacked a shackled Linares as he was being led out of the courtroom. The other inmate was upset about the possibility of getting a nine-year prison sentence, according to authorities.

No charges were filed in that incident.

https://twitter.com/komonews/status/875603598893346816

A jury found Linares guilty earlier this month of assaulting a corrections officer in December 2016. Authorities said Linares punched the officer in the head repeatedly as he was returning his lunch tray. The officer was hit three times before he could fight back, and Linares broke off when another officer arrived to subdue him.

Prosecutors said the officer’s injuries included a swollen lip and a bruise on his eye.

In May, Linares was sentenced to 10 years in prison for second-degree assault in the stabbing of a man outside a Sunnyside laundromat in February 2016.

Linares was loitering outside the Agitation Station laundromat when he confronted a man who was trying to leave with his two young daughters, according to court documents. Prosecutors said Linares stabbed the man in the back when he denied being a gang member.

The man was not a gang member but Linares is affiliated with a Lower Valley gang, police said.

RECOMMENDED FOR YOU