KALAMAZOO (WKZO) — If Adam Shigwadja asked for a bench trial instead of a jury trial, hoping a judge would be more sympathetic than a jury, then it worked. But the Judge wasn’t that sympathetic, finding him guilty of assault, Home invasion and arson.
Adam loved Sophia Putney-Wilcox to the point of obsession, and she just did not love him back. In fact he had become a frightenting nuisance who would just not take no for an answer.
It all came to a head last September when he broke into her home, ambushed her in her bedroom with a knife and a squeeze bottle filled with gas, apparently planning to go out in bloody blaze of glory.
He managed to cut her once and set the place on fire when the victim’s brother burst through her door with a baseball bat to save her and send him scurrying out a window.
He had been charged with assault with intent to murder. The judge reduced that to assault with intent to do great bodily harm. It will mean a lighter sentence, but it will still mean many years in prison.
