The lover of a woman who was sentenced last month to 10 years in state prison for her role in a machete attack that nearly killed her husband pleaded guilty to several felonies today that earned him 14 years in prison.
The victim and his family gave their blessing to the sentencing deal for Michael Calvin Shores II because they want to move on. Shores has already served nearly five years in jail for the brutal attack by a butcher he recruited.
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The sentence is the final to come down in the attempted murder of 49-year-old Frank Sharpski, who was left for dead in the alley behind his Fountain Valley apartment with a fractured skull, a severed thumb and fingers, a Chinatown job on his nose and several other machete wounds. He now struggles to use a walker, is missing fingers and still suffers from post traumatic stress disorder.
Mary Katheryn Sharpski Gets 10 Years in Attempted Machete Murder of Husband
Antonio Cinco Ortega Gets 25 to Life in Violent Machete Attack for Victim's Wife and Her Lover
Mary and Frank Sharpski took Shores in as a tenant at their two-bedroom apartment after he lost his job as a security guard. Shores was to clean the apartment and care for the couple's two daughters and son instead of paying rent, but by the spring of 2009, he and Mary had become lovers. They conspired to hire 26-year-old butcher Antonio Cinco Ortega of Santa Ana to kill Frank in what would appear to be a robbery attempt.
Frank Sharpski was in the alley heading to the FedEx van he drove to work around 5:30 a.m. on March 3, 2009, when he was approached by Ortega, a stranger, wielding the machete with a three-foot-long blade that would change their lives, Shores' and 50-year-old Mary Sharpski's forever.
Shores must serve at least 85 percent of his sentence, Deputy District Attorney Lynda Fernandez told City News Service. He pleaded guilty to attempted murder and mayhem–the two felony counts of which he was initially charged–and assault with a deadly weapon, conspiracy to commit assault with a deadly weapon, battery causing serious injury and false imprisonment by violence.
The latter felonies were added today to make Shores eligible for the 14-year sentence, Fernandez explained. She added Shores' plea deal included more time behind bars because the case against him was stronger than Sharpski's. It came out during her trial that she had been abused by Frank.
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OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.