Teen gets three years for stabbing at North East-area Walmart

ELKTON — A 17-year-old North East teen accused of stabbing a Walmart worker in her upper chest in March in the vestibule of the Northeast Plaza store received a three-year prison term Friday after accepting a plea deal.

Cecil County Circuit Court Administrative Judge Keith A. Baynes imposed an eight-year sentence on the defendant, Tyler Vermilyea, and then suspended five years of it, moments after Vermilyea had pleaded guilty to first-degree assault as part of the plea bargain in which prosecutors dropped related charges in exchange.

The judge credited Vermilyea for approximately six months that he had served in the Cecil County Detention Center as a pretrial inmate in lieu of $200,000 bond, since his March arrest. Because first-degree assault is considered a crime of violence, Vermilyea must serve 18 months, half of his term, before he would be eligible for his first parole hearing.

Baynes ordered Vermilyea to serve four years of supervised probation after completing his three-year term in a Maryland Department of Corrections prison. The judge listed numerous conditions, including undergoing drug, alcohol and mental health treatment. Baynes also barred Vermilyea from entering “any and all” Walmart stores and from having any contact with the victim.

Vermilyea's assistant public defender, James A. Close, asked Baynes to recommend Patuxent Institution in Jessup for his client because it offers youth programs and other services that could benefit Vermilyea during his incarceration and when he returns to society. Vermilyea, who was charged as an adult, turns 18 in October.

The judge's sentence mirrored the terms of a plea agreement reached by Close and Assistant State's Attorney Robert Sentman, and their recommended sentence was within state sentencing guidelines, which are based on a defendant's criminal record and other factors.

Instead of reading aloud a statement of fact during the plea portion of the courtroom hearing, Sentman opted to proceed on the written account of the incident in Cecil County District Court charging documents.

The incident started about 6 a.m. on March 21 outside the store’s entrance, where Vermilyea asked a male Walmart worker for a cigarette, police said. That led to an argument in which Vermilyea reportedly used racial slurs, police added.

After hearing the argument while inside her nearby car, a 50-year-old woman who also works at Walmart got out of her vehicle and separated the two men, police reported. At that point, according to police, she walked into the Walmart with her co-worker, who is a maintenance employee.

Vermilyea followed them, police reported.

“The investigation indicates the suspect walked up beside the victim and stabbed her near her collarbone with the folding knife. The suspect then fled from the store. The involved (Walmart maintenance worker) was not reported to have been injured,” Greg Shipley, a Maryland State Police spokesman, told the Cecil Whig shortly after the incident.

An ambulance transported the woman to Union Hospital in Elkton, where doctors treated a stab wound near her collarbone and later discharged her, police reported.

MSP investigators captured Vermilyea outside the nearby Dollar General store shortly after the incident, police said. Vermilyea reportedly had punched out windows to that Dollar General shortly before investigators arrived, police added.

Searching the teen after taking him into custody, MSP investigators confiscated a folding knife with a “brass knuckle-style handle,” according to police.

The woman Vermilyea had stabbed was in the courtroom during Friday's hearing, but she declined to give a victim-impact statement.

While addressing the judge before sentencing, Vermilyea turned toward the back of the courtroom and looked at the woman, who was seated in a pew.

“I'm really sorry. I wish I could take it back, but it's too late. I'm really sorry,” Vermilyea said. Vermilyea also told his victim that he would strive to be a “better person.”

Close told the judge that Vermilyea had a “rough or non-existent parent situation,” before noting that Vermilyea's grandmother and two aunts were seated in a pew behind his client and that they support him. One of those women could be seen crying at times during the hearing.

Despite that lack of parental supervision, according to Close, “He (Vermilyea) has a quite extremely minor juvenile record, a couple of incidents."

The defense attorney also told the judge that Vermilyea's substance abuse greatly propelled his actions on the day of the assault.

“He was under the influence of a variety of things on the day in question. He was out of control. He was uninhibited. I'm sure he's really sorry it occurred,” said Close, who then pushed for Vermilyea serving his term at Patuxent Institution. “But this may be the best thing that could have happened, because he can get help, get some structure, get his GED.”

After imposing the sentence, Baynes told Vermilyea, “Good luck and take advantage of those programs out there.”

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