Urbana woman gets 10 years in prison for possessing stolen guns from Thomasboro burglary | Courts-Police-Fire

URBANA – An Urbana woman has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for stealing numerous firearms from a man’s home earlier this year.

Champaign County Judge Roger Webber sentenced 41-year-old Courtney B. Toney on Monday after she pleaded guilty in July to aggravated possession of six to 10 stolen firearms.

In return for the confession, the state agreed to limit its recommended sentence to 12 years in prison.

The state also dropped one count of burglary, one count of arson, one count of criminal possession of a weapon, one count of aggravated possession of two to five stolen firearms and one count of aggravated possession of 11 to 20 stolen firearms during open plea negotiations.

The charges stem from an incident on January 8 in which a 71-year-old Thomasboro man reported the missing of approximately 28 firearms, $60,000 worth of U.S. dollars and a large number of antique silver and gold coins valued at over $100,000 from one of his residences.

Less than 48 hours after Champaign County Sheriff's officers came to the property and left, the man called police again because someone had set fire to the building the man was using as a storage facility.

A Champaign County Sheriff's Office detective testified Monday that a confidential source identified Toney as a suspect.

Investigators then learned that Toney had sold several valuable silver and gold coins for $20,000 at a Champaign jewelry store on January 15.

When questioned by police, Toney admitted that she stumbled upon the property by chance while driving through the area with another person named Lowell M. Davis.

She said they entered through a garage window, stole property and transported a number of weapons to Davis' Farmer City residence.

Toney also told police, according to the detective's statement, that Davis returned to the property the next day and set it on fire to destroy evidence.

Police later executed a search warrant on Davis' home and found what appeared to be 12 stolen firearms, but Toney reported that some of them had already been sold.

Toney was wearing a GPS monitor at the time of the incident because she was on parole in another case.

The tracking device showed that she was near the Thomasboro home at the time of the break-in, but not when it was set on fire.

Davis, 42, of Farmer City, still faces burglary, arson, illegal possession of a firearm and three counts of aggravated possession of a weapon for his alleged role in the incident.

He is scheduled to appear in court in October.

In recommending that Toney be sentenced to 12 years in prison, Assistant District Attorney Joel Fletcher called seven different law enforcement officers to the stand to testify about three separate incidents in which Toney allegedly stole from other people in Champaign County.

Tolono Police Deputy Chief John Brown testified that he conducted a welfare check on an elderly man at the Oaks Mobile Home Park on May 22, 2021.

The man was frail, disoriented, couldn't tell what year it was, and didn't understand why his electricity had been cut off, especially since it was 32 degrees outside. Inside his trailer, the room was reportedly full of animal feces, there was hardly any food, and the stove and washing machine were missing.

The man can afford food, electricity and a licensed caregiver because he receives a pension and benefits from the Veterans Administration, Brown said. Although the man could not say which bank his checking account was at, he reportedly said Toney handles his finances.

Brown presented documents showing that between January 2018 and May 2021, 818 withdrawals were made from the man's bank account at ATMs, some of them at local bars and gambling dens, as well as other expenditures on embezzled funds, the total of which the deputy police chief estimated at $204,000.

Toney spoke in jail about using the man's bank card while she was on a recorded phone line for an unrelated incident, Brown testified. She also talked about having people check on the man while she was incarcerated. Although Toney was on the man's lease, he was not his court-appointed guardian.

In another incident, on November 2, 2022, Mahomet Police responded to an incident at a home where a domestic dispute was reported. At the scene, an uninjured 72-year-old man reported that he had allowed Toney to sleep on his couch, but she had just threatened him with a knife.

A camera in the man's kitchen reportedly recorded Toney verbally threatening him and charging at him with a knife before putting it down. She was arrested and released, and the man called police about 12 hours later to report a break-in in his basement. He later noticed several belongings were missing.

Police then allegedly linked Toney to the sale of various items matching descriptions of the 72-year-old's stolen property at area pawn shops. She was charged with aggravated assault and trespassing, but those charges were also dropped as part of that deal.

In a recent case, an 80-year-old man reported that he hired Toney in April 2022 to clear brush around his farm. He later saw her carrying away property and noticed that about $1,000 worth of tools were missing. Neither that incident nor the alleged financial exploitation were ever charged.

Fletcher ultimately argued that Toney's criminal record – 17 prior convictions, including three felonies – her apparent willingness to “prey” on the elderly and her involvement in the sale of stolen weapons in the community made his recommendation of a 12-year sentence “generous.”

Toney's defense attorney, public defender Katty Sievers, recommended a prison sentence of six years, stressing that her client had a difficult childhood.

She was abused daily before being placed in foster care at less than two years old. She was never adopted and was not released from the state until she was 18.

The circumstances of her childhood led to a series of bad relationships, severe drug addiction and poor decisions for which Toney has now taken responsibility, Sievers said.

Your client recognizes that she needs appropriate treatment for her mental health issues and drug addiction and plans to participate in prison programs.

“I want to apologize for the things I have done and I realize that every action has consequences,” Toney said.

“I blame no one but myself for allowing drugs and harmful people to control my life.”

“I'm not a bad person. I had a terrible childhood where I was abused and I'm now an adult. But that's no excuse for the choices I made. I'm not a hopeless case, so please consider my judgment and don't throw me away.”

Judge Webber praised Toney for his cooperation with investigators and for even handing over diamond rings that had apparently been purchased with the stolen goods.

But when the verdict was announced, he said that the “bill” for their criminal “shopping spree” had come.

Before the negotiated deal, Toney faced a prison sentence of six to 30 years for aggravated possession of stolen firearms, a non-parole-eligible Class X felony. She must serve at least 85 percent of her sentence.