Jealous ex found guilty of shooting new boyfriend
Michael Thomas, the man who shot a rival outside the Mental Health Center of Dane County in April, has entered no contest pleas to reduced counts of second-degree endangerment and was found guilty Friday by Dane County Circuit Court Judge Daniel Moeser.
Thomas, 18, shot and wounded Tyrone Wheeler, 20, as Wheeler was standing outside the Mental Health Center on April 30 after attending a group counseling session inside the building.
Although both men had previously been charged with drug-related crimes, the shooting apparently involved a conflict over a young woman.
Wheeler told police after the shooting that he had been dating the woman, but that she began having an affair with Thomas after Wheeler was jailed on a drug charge.
Thomas and a group of friends arrived at the Mental Health Center in a van, according to court records. While one man stayed in the van and kept it running, Thomas and the others approached Wheeler. Thomas got a gun from one of the others in his group and fired three shots at Wheeler, one of which hit him in the elbow, court records show.
Another of the three shots fired by Thomas struck the front light of a car in which a man was waiting for his wife to finish work at the Mental Health Center.
Thomas was initially charged with attempted first-degree intentional homicide for shooting at Wheeler and with first-degree recklessly endangering safety for the shot that struck the car. Thomas faced a maximum of 82 and a half years of combined prison and extended supervision if he had been convicted of those charges.
But Friday, Thomas pleaded to two counts of second-degree endangering safety, and he faces a maximum of 28 years of prison and extended supervision on those charges. He will be sentenced at a later date after a pre-sentence report by the Department of Corrections is finished.
Wheeler, meanwhile, was charged in August with negligent handling of a weapon, possession of a firearm by a felon and disorderly conduct with use of a weapon.
Wheeler was involved in a large fight on Country Rose Court in the town of Madison the night of Aug. 17 and the early morning hours of Aug. 18, and later fired several shots from a pistol into the air on Ski Lane. The criminal complaint quotes a young woman involved in the incident as saying she knows Wheeler to "carry a gun with him everywhere he goes."
Wheeler's friend, Tony Longino, 19, was also charged in that incident, in which they threatened to kill a woman and her uncle, the criminal complaint in that case says.
That case remains pending, as does a case in which Wheeler faces charges of delivery of cocaine.
Also pending is a case against Michael Thomas' cousin, Phillip T. Thomas, 19. Phillip Thomas was charged with battery by a prisoner and intimidation of a victim for beating Wheeler in the Dane County Jail on Aug. 21. According to the criminal complaint in that case, Phillip Thomas beat Wheeler and told him he should accept the family's offer of $2,000 if Wheeler did not testify against Michael Thomas in the shooting case.
