McCommons gets no extra time for jail brawl

PHOTOGRAPHER: Justin Mason

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Wade McCommons wasn’t as verbose during his second sentencing in less than 24 hours Tuesday.

Already sentenced to serve up to life in prison, the 26-year-old street gang member was silent after being handed another three-year prison sentence for inciting a jail fracas last year. The sentence will run concurrent with the term of 45 years to life he received Monday for murdering Laurel Teer and committing a strong-arm robbery at a Rugby Road home.

In the jail fracas, McCommons admitted to one felony count of attempted second-degree assault in September. A second misdemeanor count of obstructing governmental administration was dismissed as part of a plea bargain.

McCommons was being lodged at the county jail’s special housing unit in December 2010 when he convinced its three other inmates to stage acts of defiance against the corrections officers. Under his urging, the inmates stopped up their toilets, tied their jail cell doors together and placed mattresses up against the bars. When the officers came in to subdue the inmates, McCommons fought back, causing a knee injury to one officer while another suffered a shoulder injury after slipping on the wet cell floor.

Also charged in the incident were Deven Moore, 21; Melchizedek Williams, 18; and Joshua Dundas, 18, all of Schenectady. Dundas admitted to one count of obstructing governmental administration and was sentenced to a year in jail; charges remain pending against Moor and Williams.

Assistant District Attorney Bill Sanderson said the incident was among many disciplinary violations McCommons has racked up since arriving at the jail last year.

He produced a roughly half-inch folder of disciplinary reports against the inmate, including extorting items from fellow prisoners to taunting the corrections officers.

“He’s racked up an unbelievable amount of disciplinary problems,” Sanderson said.

After the sentencing, McCommons was wheeled down to Schenectady City Court, where he appeared on two felony counts of criminal conspiracy to commit second-degree murder and two counts of criminal solicitation. He is also facing a count of criminal contempt, charged with violating a court order prohibiting him from distributing material being used at his trial.

McCommons was originally slated to answer the charges Friday. But authorities said he refused to attend until Tuesday.

McCommons and fellow inmate Derrick Smith, 26, were allegedly hatching a plan to have someone kill two witnesses during his second-degree murder trial in October. McCommons allegedly passed sensitive documents from his case to another inmate, who then mailed them out to someone on the outside.

During his sentencing in the Teer murder, McCommons insisted he was wrongly convicted and that the prosecutor wrongly characterized him as a “monster.” Sanderson said his discipline record in prison suggests otherwise.

“He’s a real bully,” he said. “In spite of his own testimony [Monday], he is sort of a monster.”