EVERETT — Some ill-gotten smokes and $60 split two ways has earned an Everett man a stretch behind bars.
On Wednesday, Shane Moy was given a five-year prison sentence, along with a stern lecture.
“I can’t imagine why it was worth it to do what you did over $119.44,” Snohomish County Superior Court Judge Michael Downes said. “I hope you smarten up.”
In January, Moy and his buddy, Keith Puett, were arrested for holding up Vic’s Market in Snohomish. The store’s owner reported that two masked men rushed into the small store and demanded money. Puett reportedly pointed a handgun at the owner. He handed over $60 and about eight packs of Marlboro cigarettes, worth about $60.
Police caught up with Moy, 33, outside a Lake Stevens house.
He and a couple of other people were attempting to free a car from a ditch. The car appeared to be the same one seen leaving the market shortly after the robbery.
Puett was holed up inside the house and refused to come outside, court papers said.
Eventually, SWAT members went inside and arrested him.
Police found knit caps, a ski mask, cigarette butts, a 9 mm bullet and a drug pipe inside the car. They found a handgun inside the house.
Moy pleaded guilty last week to first-degree robbery. He also admitted that he led police on a chase in a stolen car about a month before the Snohomish heist. During the pursuit through Everett, Moy rammed three police cars before he ditched the stolen Kia. He was arrested a short distance away.
On Wednesday, Downes asked Moy, a union cement worker, how much he made when he was employed. The judge pointed out that Moy could have earned what he stole in about three hours of honest work.
“Do you know how many people can’t find a decent job?” Downes asked.
He told the man that he had the means to make a good living, and instead he made “dumb” decisions that are sending him to prison.
“You got to cut it out,” the judge said.
Moy hung his head.
“I’m really embarrassed over it,” he said.
Moy was ordered to pay back what he stole in the robbery, and to cover the repair costs for the vehicles he damaged during the pursuit.
Meanwhile, Puett is scheduled to go to trial next month. If convicted of the robbery, the Lake Stevens man faces a mandatory life sentence under the state’s persistent offender law. Prosecutors say he has two prior strikes for second-degree assault.
Diana Hefley: 425-339-3463; hefley@heraldnet.com.
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