Four men who last year participated in a home invasion at an Athens student housing complex all recently received convictions and prison sentences.
The men struck individual plea bargains with the Western Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s Office, in which they each pleaded guilty to multiple felonies and received 20-year sentences.
Three of the plea agreements were finalized in early August, with the judge signing off on the fourth deal on Monday.
The three men who authorities say were armed when they entered the home at Riverbend Club apartments were each sentenced to eight years in prison and 12 on probation. They were Caius Schilling Joesting, 20, of Norcross; Ashton Jentre Sutton, 21, of Athens; and Jacob Morat Faust, 21, of Cumming.
Nicholas Fred Nasuti, 20, of Athens, received a lesser sentence of five years in prison and 15 on probation. He was said by authorities to have been the person who drove the armed robbers to the housing complex.
Nasuti pleaded guilty to two counts of aggravated assault and prosecutors dismissed seven other criminal counts of the indictment.
Joesting, Faust and Sutton each pleaded guilty to first-degree home invasion, armed robbery and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony.
According to Athens-Clarke County police, the home invasion occurred the afternoon of Sept. 21, when Faust, Sutton and Joesting entered a Riverbend Club apartment occupied by two residents and another man. Police said the suspects, one armed with a handgun, told occupants of the apartment they were looking for “weed” and money.
After they were unable to find what they were looking for, police said, the suspects stole a laptop computer, an iPad, a printer, a cellphone and cash altogether valued at $1,931.
One of the residents told police he knew two of the robbers because they had been to his home the day before.
Police said that a description of the suspects and their vehicle was broadcast over the radio, and a Clarke County sheriff’s deputy conducted a traffic stop on the vehicle on Riverbend Parkway near South Milledge Avenue.
All three occupants of the vehicle were arrested and charged with first-degree home invasion and armed robbery.
Nasuti was not with his accomplices because police said he was dropped off at his Lakeside Drive home prior to the deputy stopping the others.
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