A Baker City man who has been in the Baker County Jail for almost a year, after being accused of holding a knife to his ex-girlfriend’s stomach and preventing her from leaving an apartment, pleaded guilty to three charges on Feb. 7 in a plea agreement with the district attorney’s office.

Isaiah Steven Brown, 21, will remain in the jail until March 23, according to court records. He has been in jail since his arrest on Feb. 26, 2024.

Visiting Judge Thomas O. Branford sentenced Brown to jail terms on Brown’s guilty pleas to menacing and unlawful use of a weapon, both constituting domestic violence, and harassment.

Unlawful use of a weapon is a Class C felony. The two other charges are misdemeanors.

The most serious charge, first-degree kidnapping, a Class A felony that could have resulted in a prison term were Brown convicted, was dismissed as part of the plea agreement.

Michael Spaulding, chief deputy district attorney who prosecuted Brown, said that although the jail terms could have extended Brown’s incarceration for about five more months, Brown will be released March 23 in part because he has worked in the jail during his incarceration, which qualified him for a reduction in the jail sentence.

Branford sentenced Brown to five years of supervised probation on the illegal use of a weapon charge. If he violates the probation he would be sentenced to 50 months in prison.

Spaulding said on Tuesday morning, Feb. 11, that he believes the plea agreement is a “reasonable compromise.”

He said he spoke with the victim about the proposed plea agreement. Spaulding said she wanted to see the case resolved.

Brown had been scheduled to go to trial this week, but by pleading guilty he avoided a trial.

Spaulding and Brown’s court-appointed attorney, Damien Yervasi, attended a settlement conference Feb. 5.

Spaulding said that because Brown had no criminal record, he would have qualified, under Oregon’s sentencing guidelines, for probation, but not jail, on the unlawful use of a weapon charge.

Spaulding said he and Yervasi agreed to upgrade that charge, to a maximum of 50 months in prison, but they also agreed to what’s known as a “downward departure” in sentencing based on Brown’s guilty plea.

The judgment record states that “this downward departure is justified because of the extreme emotional abuse the defendant suffered as a child. He needs multiple kinds of counseling, and this judgment is intended to afford the defendant access to necessary counseling.”

The downward departure means Brown was sentenced to probation, rather than prison, on the unlawful use of a weapon charge, but it also means that if his probation is revoked he would be sentenced to five years in prison. That wouldn’t have been an option without the agreement to move the charge higher on the sentencing guideline grid, Spaulding said.

The judgment requires Brown to complete evaluations for domestic violence, alcohol and drug use, and mental health, all by June 1, 2027.

The crimes

Baker City Police arrested Brown on Feb. 26, 2024. 

According to court records, police officer Mason Powell, responding to a 911 call about a woman being held against her will in the 2400 block of Second Street, arrived at the address and heard a woman screaming from the second story of the building.

A neighbor told Powell that he had heard the woman yelling “please stop” before Powell got there.

The woman told Powell that Brown, who had been her boyfriend at times over the past three years, had held her down on a bed and put a fixed-blade knife to her stomach.

The woman “appeared severely frightening, was visibly shaking and crying,” Powell wrote in a probable cause affidavit.

Powell then talked to Brown, who was in the upstairs apartment. According to the affidavit, Brown told Powell that he was angry because another man had called his ex-girlfriend’s phone, and because she owed him money.

Brown admitted picking up his ex-girlfriend and throwing her down on a bed. He said a fixed-blade knife that Powell saw next to the bed is his, and that he might have held the knife close to his ex-girlfriend’s stomach.

During a later interview with the woman at the hospital, she told Powell that the incident went on for about three hours. She said she locked herself in a bathroom but that Brown broke open the door.

She told Powell that Brown locked her in the bathroom by propping a chair against the door.

She also said that Brown stopped her from leaving the apartment three times.