If You Cant Do The Time….
By: Tommy “Tj” Sotomayor

CLEVELAND, Ohio — A court hearing ended in chaos Thursday as a judge sentenced a man who robbed former NFL wide receiver and Super Bowl champion Joe Jurevicius.

Robert Howse called the 43-year prison sentence handed down by a Cuyahoga County judge “bulls—t,” and members of his family screamed obscenities as sheriff’s deputies wrestled the 24-year-old Howse out of the courtroom.

One woman called Judge Nancy McDonnell a “sick b—h” and stormed out of the courtroom.

The scene was a chaotic end to a hearing where Jurevicius, a Cleveland-native returned to his hometown Browns to finish out his 11-year NFL, described how Howse terrorized him at gunpoint for 30 minutes during the September robbery.

“He terrorized me for 30 minutes,” Jurevicius said in court Thursday.

Howse pleaded guilty in January to aggravated burglary, aggravated robbery burglary and other charges in the Sept. 14 robbery of Jurevicius and another home-invasion robbery of a 70-year-old woman two days earlier.

Howse’s cousin, State Rep. Stephanie Howse, asked McDonnell in a letter read aloud in court to take into account that as a 4-year-old boy, Howse witnessed his 16-year-old uncle hang himself.

“Hurt people hurt people,” the letter said.

Jurevicius told McDonnell that he too had experienced trauma. He said he is diagnosed with depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, and is dealing with a body battered by an 11-year NFL career. A man died in Jurevicius’s arms after he was crushed by concrete in a freak accident, and in 2003, Jurevicius and his wife lost a nine-week-old son from complications due to a premature birth.

Jurevicius, at the time a Tampa Bay Buccaneer, left his son’s hospital the night before the year’s NFC Championship game to join his team, according to a 2003 UPI article. He caught a 71-yard touchdown pass in the next day’s game that clinched a berth in Super Bowl XXXVII. Jurevicius caught four passes for 78 yards as Tampa Bay defeated the Oakland Raiders, 48-21, UPI reported.

On Sept. 14, Jurevicius said he went out to his barn to turn off the lights after his family finished dinner in his Gates Mills home and encountered an armed Howse in an event that he said changed his life.

Howse snatched the gloves that Jurevicius wore during that Super Bowl and wore them as he held the 6-feet 5-inch Jurevicius at gunpoint for more than 30 minutes as he demanded money and electronics and made Jurevicius open his safe. Howse then led Jurevicius to the home where his wife and children were, and threatened to shoot Jurevicius, he said.

Jurevicius opened the door and asked his wife to bring all the cash he could. He also offered Howse his Super Bowl ring. Prosecutors said Howse told them he rejected the ring because he would surely get caught if he tried to sell it, that he and wore the gloves so he wouldn’t leave behind fingerprints.

Jurevicius ultimately escaped by running into the house and locking the door. He said he grabbed a handgun and hid with his wife and children until police came to the house.

“He wore the damn gloves I wore in the Super Bowl while my son was fighting for his life,” Jurevicius said in court.

Jurevicius asked for McDonnell to impose the maximum possible sentence. He said that the incident made him wonder if moving his family back to Cleveland was the right decision.

“My grandmother told me a long time ago if you don’t have anything nice to say about somebody, don’t say it,” Jurevicius said. “At this point your honor, I have nothing good to say.”

In the Sept. 12 robbery, Howse broke into the home of a 70-year-old woman and hid beneath her bed until she walked into her bedroom, then jumped out and pointed a gun at her. The woman ran into the bathroom and locked the door behind her, and called 911 until police came.

Howse was wearing a GPS ankle monitor at the time of the robberies because he was on parole after serving more than five years in prison for another home invasion. In that incident, Howse held two 15-year-old boys at gunpoint, Assistant Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Elaina Thomas said.

In his own comments, Howse said he carried out the robberies to make good an a $1,500 drug debt. The dealer he owed the money to had started to threaten Howse’s life and the life of his fiancee, Howse said.