The victim of a September 2015 shooting at a home near Ridgefield was sentenced Thursday to five years in prison for his part in provoking the incident.
Mark Buckner, 51, entered guilty pleas Monday in Clark County Superior Court to third-degree assault, second-degree malicious mischief and bail jumping. He entered an “in re Barr” plea to the assault charge, which allows a defendant to plead guilty to a lesser related charge he didn’t commit in order to avoid conviction for a greater offense.
His sentence will run concurrent to the 51-month sentence he is currently serving for cases in Cowlitz County.
The altercation began shortly after 8 p.m. Sept. 6, 2015, at a residence at 2305 N.E. 209th St. Buckner came by to pick up some of his personal items and began yelling at people there for putting his clothes in a mud puddle, according to a probable cause affidavit.
Multiple people at the residence said Buckner had been causing problems. He drove his pickup erratically, acting as if he was going to run over the residents, Michael Hatch and his wife, the affidavit states.
Hatch fired a rifle at the pickup and struck Buckner multiple times, court records said. Hatch was sentenced in November 2015 to nine months in jail for unlawful possession of a firearm in connection with the incident.
Buckner drove away from the scene, reportedly causing a hit-and-run crash, and was found later that night at a Kaiser Permanente medical office in Portland. He was transported to a Portland trauma center for treatment.
Buckner was initially facing a “third strike” but plead to lesser crimes, avoiding the strike. Under the state’s three-strikes law, offenders convicted three times of certain violent and sexual felonies receive mandatory life sentences.
The prosecution said there were “proof problems” with the case, particularly because of the shooting and difficultly getting in contact with witnesses.
Buckner was given credit for 368 days in custody.
