A 39-year-old Summerton man sentenced to five years in prison last year for his role in three separate jewelry store thefts in 2015 has had his appeal dropped at the state level.
The state Court of Appeals dropped the appeal last month from Lorenzo Ragin and also relieved his Columbia attorney, LaNelle Cantey DuRant. The decision comported with the U.S. Supreme Court case in which a court-appointed attorney may file a motion to withdraw from the appeal of a criminal case because of his belief that any grounds for appeal are frivolous.
Ragin pleaded guilty Feb. 11, 2016, to an enhanced shoplifting charge, receiving a sentence of five years in prison to be served concurrently with a prior sentence re-instated due to a probation violation by pleading to the shoplifting charge.
For the latter, Ragin had originally been charged with three counts of shoplifting items valued between $2,000 and $10,000, for thefts that happened from February to July 2015 in several Sumter stores, including Kmart, Reliable Pawn and Sumter Pawn.
According to reports from the Sumter Police Department, Ragin walked into the stores, asked to see certain items of jewelry and then absconded with the items. Ragin also received 40 months during a plea on Feb. 21, 2016, for grand larceny of a value between $2,000 and $10,000 in Florence County. Details of that case are unavailable.
The cases in which Ragin was given probation included a third-degree burglary sentence of six months from Dec. 3, 2015, and a sentence of two years and nine months for possession of cocaine from Oct. 28, 2015.
