Judge sentences Niles man for brutal assault of girlfriend

Edward Doran let out a deep sigh and stood in silence for several seconds as he stared down at a piece of paper he had brought into Berrien County Trial Court in Niles.

There were no visible tears on his face and his voice was calm and deliberate as he spoke to Judge Dennis Wiley.

“I do love the victim,” said the 41-year-old Niles resident, referring to the woman he hit in the head with a hammer, stabbed more than a dozen times and strangled until she became unconscious at a Niles home in November.

Minutes earlier, Doran told the court that despite being on a mixture of drugs at the time of the incident, he is ultimately to blame for his actions, including that he threatened to blow up his home when police came to arrest him.

“I don’t deserve leniency. I know that,” he said.

Wiley agreed, sentencing Doran to six years and eight months in the Michigan Department of

Corrections on the most serious count of assault by strangulation. The sentence was 23 months longer than the maximum specified in the sentencing guidelines (29 to 57 months). Wiley’s reason for handing down a more serious punishment was that the guidelines did not take into account the brutality of the attack and the number of lives placed in danger.

“The level of violence was horrific,” Wiley said.

According to court documents, Doran strangled his girlfriend and stabbed her more than a dozen times, including once in the chest at a residence in the 400 block of South State Street in Niles on Nov. 30. She sustained a broken rib and a collapsed lung. Doran also hit her in the head with a hammer before she escaped out a window to the safety of a nearby home.

When police arrived, Doran threatened to blow up the home. Wiley said Doran had turned on propane gas inside the residence, endangering the lives of his neighbors and the police, fire and ambulance responders at the scene. The neighborhood was evacuated before Doran was arrested.

Defense attorney Norman Perry said his client was on a combination of medications that more than likely contributed to his actions.

Doran told the court he manipulated a Tennessee doctor into prescribing him drugs — an admission Wiley took issue with.

“You found a doctor that would be your Dr. Feel Good — one that would give you what you wanted,” Wiley said.

“I recognize that you need to get help, but I also have the protect the community.”

The victim was present at Monday’s sentencing hearing but did not speak.

Steven Pierangeli, the county’s chief trial attorney, said the victim wanted Doran to receive the minimum sentence.

“She does not believe prison is the place for him,” Pierangeli said.

Doran told the court he was clean and stayed out of trouble from 2003 to 2012 before regressing back into using again. During his clean period, Doran said he obtained a college degree in chemistry.

Doran was also sentenced to 40 months in prison for one count of aggravated domestic violence. That sentence will be served concurrently, or at the same time, as the other sentence. He has credit for 240 days already served.