Pellet gun shooter sent to prison
BONNERS FERRY - A 20-year-old Bonners Ferry man will serve six months in prison after pleading guilty to shooting two girls several times with a pellet gun.
According to court records, Bonners Ferry Police officer Heiko Arshat was on patrol Feb. 28 when he saw two teen girls walking south on U.S. 95 near milepost 506 around 4 a.m.
He pulled over and one of the girls, crying, said she had been shot and was walking to the hospital. Arshat took them to Boundary Community Hospital, where he was told that both girls, ages 15 and 14, had been shot around 4 p.m. the day before while walking in the area of Valley View School.
Neither girl saw their assailant, they said.
One of the girls was treated for bleeding wounds in her legs and buttocks, and had also been hit in the side of her head. The other said she had been shot as well, but didn't need treatment.
After further investigation, the girls admitted they had been downstairs at a home the afternoon of the shooting with two boys, including Aron D.J. Schnittlinger, 20.
They said Schnittlinger went upstairs, got a pellet gun, returned downstairs and began shooting them.
Schnittlinger denied the allegations, but the other boy told police he watched his friend shoot both girls about eight times each, saying, "Aron shoots everyone with that BB gun."
After a court hearing March 11, the young man's mother, Crickett Schnittlinger-Cantos, was charged with intimidating a witness, a felony, after she cursed at one of the two girls and threatened to reveal potentially embarrassing personal information if she testified again against her son.
Aron Schnittlinger later pleaded guilty to the amended charge of felony aggravated assault and was sentenced to 1 1/2-to three years in prison. That sentence was suspended and jurisdiction was retained for 180-days, during which Schnittlinger will serve a rider program at the Cottonwood Correctional Facility. If he successfully completes the program, he could be placed on felony probation and return home. If not, the original sentence will be carried out.
Crickett Schnittlinger-Cantos, who could have faced prison time on the original charge against her, likewise pleaded guilty to a lesser offense, disturbing the peace, a misdemeanor. She was sentenced to 30 days in jail, with 28 days suspended, and fined $202.50 and court costs. She will also serve a year's probation.