PORTLAND — An Auburn man who stabbed a man in Lewiston in 2019 while on federal probation was back in court Tuesday, charged with violating the terms of his release.
Carlos Torres Androscoggin County Jail photo
Carlos Torres, 42, pleaded guilty in 2008 to having crack cocaine with intent to distribute. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison. But a judge reduced that sentence in March 2019 to less than 14 years under the First Step Act, passed in 2018, aimed at federal prison reform. Torres was released from prison in 2019.
But, after his release, he was charged with assaulting a man with a knife in a Lewiston apartment building in December 2019, stabbing him multiple times, a felony crime as well as an alleged violation of a condition of his supervised release.
The incident was captured on camera and was reviewed by local police before his arrest.
Torres pleaded no contest to a charge of Class B aggravated assault on April 30. He was sentenced to 16 months he had already served, his attorney said Tuesday.
According to court documents, Torres’ probation officer also claimed he violated the terms of his supervised release before the stabbing incident by repeatedly submitting urine samples that tested positive for marijuana. One sample also tested positive for cocaine and methamphetamine, the officer wrote.
On Tuesday, Torres appeared in U.S. District Court in a tan jail suit.
U.S. District Court Magistrate Judge John Rich III appointed Lewiston attorney George Hess to represent the indigent Torres.
Hess said his client planned to challenge probable cause of the alleged revocation of his probation and would argue that he be released from federal custody pending a hearing on the petition to revoke.
If he’s found to have violated his probation, he would face up to two additional years on his prison sentence and up to a lifetime of supervised release.
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