Man who struck acquaintance with vehicle sentenced locally

A Michigan man has been given a hefty sentence in Defiance County Common Pleas Court for trying to run over an acquaintance in 2022 during an argument.

Judge Joseph Schmenk sentenced Garry Pond II, 37, Cassopolis, Mich., to a six- to nine-year prison term on two counts of felonious assault, each a second-degree felony.

A charge of attempted murder, a first-degree felony, was dismissed as part of the plea agreement between Prosecutor Morris Murray’s office and Pond’s attorney, Jeffrey Horvath of Defiance.

According to Murray, Pond will be eligible for early judicial release after serving five years in prison.

Pond had been indicted by a Defiance County grand jury in July 2022.

The charges alleged that on July 1, 2022 he struck an acquaintance — also from Michigan — with his vehicle on Defiance County’s Mansfield Road as they were passing through the area.

“They had been in a physical altercation,” explained Murray, “and the one subject (the victim) was walking way from the altercation and this defendant got in the car and tried to basically run him over.”

The victim sustained serious, but not “life-threatening” injuries, Murray had told The Crescent-News previously. He was briefly hospitalized after being transported by an EMS unit.

Murray noted Thursday that the victim has had “extensive medical bills and continues to recover from his injuries.”

According to the prosecutor, Pond had a prior criminal record and had been held in Michigan on a pending case before being returned to Ohio in November.