TERRE HAUTE, Ind. — A western Indiana man will plead guilty in a 2020 attack in which he entered a home swinging a nail-studded wooden club, leaving two women with facial wounds and injuring three other people.
Chelton R. James, 23, had faced a trial set for Monday but he entered a plea agreement Thursday on one count of aggravated battery that calls for a 20-year sentence, with nine years to be served in prison and three years on home detention. He also faces eight years on probation.
The Terre Haute man had originally faced a charge of aggravated battery causing permanent disfigurement, three counts of battery by means of a deadly weapon and one count of burglary, the Tribune-Star reported.
Terre Haute police responded to a fight last year in March where officers found several people at the front of a house arguing with multiple people in a vehicle on the street.
Multiple witnesses said James had forced his way into that house and swung a club studded with nails multiple times, striking two women in the face, one male in the head, one male in the shoulder and another male in the hand.
The women were taken for medical treatment, with one woman transferred to a trauma hospital due to the severity of her injuries.
