A 75-year-old Michigan man who pleaded no contest for shooting an elderly pro-life volunteer during a heated argument over abortion was sentenced Tuesday to community service.
Richard Harvey was ordered to complete 100 hours of community service and given a suspended jail sentence of two months and a delayed sentence of one year on probation.
Harvey pleaded no contest last month to felonious assault, careless discharge of a firearm causing injury, and reckless discharge of a firearm after wounding then-83-year-old Joan Jacobson on Sept. 20 at Harvey's home in Odessa Township.
"I came out and she is screaming and having a great old time, and being told … at least a dozen times, ‘You’re trespassing, get off the property,'" Harvey, told WOOD-TV just days after the shooting.
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Jacobson told investigators that she was asking a woman at the home to vote against a proposed constitutional amendment, which ultimately passed in November, that would guarantee the right to abortion in the state when she was told to leave.
Harvey told the station that despite being told to leave, the woman continued "ranting and raving" and waving her clipboard.
"I’m thinking she’s going to smack Sharon with it. So without thinking, I went to club it away with the rifle and my finger was still in the trigger guard. It went off and hit her about in here," he told the station, pointing to his right shoulder.
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Jacobson told the Detroit News that she had heard a shot and felt "very severe" pain in her back. She said the bullet entered the top of her shoulder and exited through her back.
Harvey has said the shooting was accidental, but Jacobson has maintained she believes it was intentional after she had argued with Harvey's wife.
Judge Suzanne Hoseth Kreeger also ordered Harvey to pay $347.19 in restitution and to avoid all contact with Jacobson.
Fox News’ Emma Colton and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
