By Rich Cholodofsky

Published: Tuesday, November 6, 2012, 12:01 a.m.
Updated: Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Westmoreland County Judge John E. Blahovec told a Hempfield man Monday that he hoped he will serve every day of 40 years for trying to kill his former girlfriend last year.

Lawrence Darnell Redman, 45, was sentenced by the judge to 20 to 40 years in prison for shooting Anamarie Henderson, 28, the mother of two children who was left paralyzed from the waist down.

“There is no doubt in my mind you intended to kill her and you almost did,” Blahovec told Redman. “You deserve total confinement for as long as possible.”

A jury convicted Redman in August of attempted murder and aggravated assault for shooting Henderson four times on Sept. 24, 2011. He fired a .380-caliber semiautomatic pistol at close range as Henderson got out of her car, where she had been sleeping as it was parked in front of her mother's Salem Township home, according to trial testimony.

The two had argued outside Wal-Mart in Hempfield and Henderson had driven off.

At trial, Redman contended he did not intend to shoot Henderson. He testified that she ran into four warning shots he fired in an attempt to ward her off.

“It wasn't my intention,” Redman said in court Monday.

Henderson, 28, asked that Redman be confined for life.

From her wheelchair, she told Blahovec of her daily struggles with paralysis and how it has affected her ability to care for her children, who are ages 5 and 4.

“I will never live the same life I once did,” Henderson said. “I'm paying the consequences of someone else's actions. I'm doing his time. I try to see the light at the end of the tunnel but there is no end to my tunnel.”

Henderson's brother, Anthony, was killed in a double shooting in a Washington Township home a month before she was attacked by Redman.

Assistant District Attorney Allen Powanda said Redman had previously been arrested 59 times and there were 18 allegations previously raised against him for domestic abuse.

Blahovec agreed with Powanda that Redman's past warranted a harsh sentence.

“You have a history of violence and a lot of it is directed at women,” Blahovec told Redman.

Rich Cholodofsky is a staff writer for Trib Total Media. He can be reached at 724-830-6293 or rcholodofsky@tribweb.com.

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