A judge on Thursday had little sympathy for a man who blamed his drug addiction for why he left the Mardis Gras Casino last summer and robbed a Charleston bank and then returned to continue gambling.
Charleston resident Kerry Johnson, 52, who pleaded guilty in January to second-degree robbery, was sentenced to the maximum five to 18 years in prison.
Kanawha County Circuit Judge Duke Bloom pointed out Johnson knew of his problems with drugs for more than 20 years. Johnson was given credit for more than 200 days he's already spent in jail.
"You have failed to do anything about it," Bloom told Johnson. "You need to be punished. We also need to send a message to the community that bank robberies are not acceptable."
Johnson got up from a blackjack table on the morning of Aug. 2, 2016, put down a $25 chip to hold his spot and then drove to City National Bank on Bridge Road.
Once inside, Johnson handed a teller a note, saying he had a bomb and a weapon. He got away with about $5,000 in cash.
"I go into my own bank that I've banked with for 40 years with no mask," Johnson said. "I was committing suicide. It just didn't work out like that.
"I'm no bank robber. I'm a bad drug addict and gambler," Johnson continued.
In response, Kanawha assistant prosecutor Fred Giggenbach reminded the judge about more details of the robbery.
Johnson wore sunglasses and a hat into the bank and covered his neck with a towel, Giggenbach said. When the teller began counting him out $20 bills, Johnson demanded $100 bills, according to Giggenbach.
"He says he's not a bank robber - baloney," the prosecutor said. "He's a very dangerous bank robber."
In the hours after the robbery, Charleston police received an anonymous tip that a man who matched the description of the suspect given by bank employees lived on Churchill Drive near South Hills. When police arrived at the house, they found a green Mazda Miata, the same kind of car they'd been told that the robber fled in.
Johnson was sleeping on a couch inside the house. Stuffed between couch cushions, police found a large sum of cash, Giggenbach said.
About $500 of the money taken during the bank robbery was later found at the blackjack table where Johnson had been gambling, according to the prosecutor.
Johnson told Bloom on Thursday he was making between $300,000 to $400,000 a year. He owned his own marketing firm but called his wealth "a double-edged sword."
"I made so much money it never ran out," he said.
Bloom quickly asked Johnson about his current assets and Johnson replied he had lost everything to gambling.
John Sullivan, Johnson's lawyer with the Kanawha Public Defender's Office, had asked Bloom to hand down an alternative sentence that would allow Johnson to serve time on home confinement at the home of his elderly mother in Pocahontas County.
Johnson was willing to submit to random drug screenings as part of his sentence, his lawyer said.
"He knows he has to live a sober life," said Sullivan. "This arrest might have saved his life."
Reach Kate White at kate.white@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-1723 or follow @KateLWhite on Twitter.