One of two people involved in Mason City shooting pleads guilty to lesser charge, placed on probation

MASON CITY — One of two people involved in a shooting incident this summer in Mason City has been sentenced.

The incident took place near the intersection of 4th and South Illinois on the afternoon of August 23rd with witnesses reporting someone in a vehicle shooting at another vehicle then driving away. Police say a bullet went through the rear driver’s door, through a back door, and then struck another vehicle that had two people inside. Nobody was injured in either vehicle.

Police located the vehicle that the gunfire came from at a local residence and after securing the area arrested 21-year-old Jacob Patterson without incident and charged him with intimidation with a dangerous weapon, a Class C felony.

Police in September made a second arrest, charging that 19-year-old Courtney Smith assisted Patterson with presenting a firearm and pointing it at the vehicle, and then discarding the firearm in an attempt to conceal the crime.

Smith was originally charged with the Class C felony of intimidation with a dangerous weapon, but she pleaded guilty this week to the charge of accessory after the fact, an aggravated misdemeanor. District Judge DeDra Schroeder issued a deferred judgment, sentencing Smith to two years probation and an $855 civil penalty, which was suspended.

Patterson’s trial is scheduled to start on January 25th.