Man marries, receives 18-year assault sentence

SPOKANE — Call it connubial bliss.

The groom wore a gray Spokane County Jail jumpsuit. The bride wore black.

Just before Brian Lee Benefiel pleaded guilty Monday morning to residential burglary and assault in an incident last year where he hit a man over the head with a hammer, he was married by Spokane County Superior Court Judge Ellen Kalama Clark. Her courtroom was briefly closed for the ceremony, performed after a request from Benefiel's public defenders.

"I don't want to hurt nobody no more," the tearful 26-year-old said before Clark sentenced him to 18 years in prison — and congratulated him for the hope implicit in his marriage.

"You have something else to look forward to," Clark said.

Cassandra Benefiel, the bride, quickly left the courtroom after the sentencing of her new husband.

Benefiel wanted to get married before he started serving his sentence, which was the result of a plea agreement, said public defenders Anna Nordtvedt and John Hunt Whaley.

"This avoided the risk of trial," Nordtvedt said.

Benefiel had two previous felony "strikes" and a third conviction likely would have put him in prison for life with no possibility of parole. A sixth-grade dropout, Benefiel moved to Spokane from Alabama when he was 12 and started doing drugs, but later completed his GED.

Clark imposed the recommended 18-year sentence and Benefiel waived his appeal rights. The judge also ordered Benefiel into chemical dependency treatment — which she said was a factor in his crime — and agreed to a 10-year no-contact order with his victims, Michael S. Wilson and Lisa Robertson.

Benefiel struck Wilson with a claw hammer on Aug. 9 in an apartment at 527 W. Sinto, according to a police affidavit. When officers arrived, Benefiel had left and Wilson was bleeding profusely from his skull.

Benefiel was arrested 11 days later after a man checking on the welfare of his father-in-law found an unknown man matching Benefiel's description taking a shower inside his relative's home in the 1500 block of West Fairview Ave. Benefiel fled on foot, wearing only jeans, but was overtaken by a Spokane policeman.

At Benefiel's arraignment, Spokane County Superior Court Judge Michael Price noted he had felony convictions for second-degree assault, riot and harassment, plus three misdemeanor convictions, seven failures to appear and 17 felony warrants.

As part of the plea agreement, the charges against Benefiel were reduced from attempted first-degree murder to third-degree assault and residential burglary.