Kevin Bennett refused to die.
And that's the only reason you're not facing a murder charge, Bennett told Alexander J. Peyton as the two men faced each other on Wednesday morning for the first time since Peyton shot Bennett in the face during a confrontation following a traffic accident on Interstate 79 in Erie on Feb. 27, 2023.
Bennett, who has undergone multiple surgeries and bears the scars and shrapnel from being shot in the jaw by Peyton that day, said in an Erie County courtroom it had taken him almost a full year to say Peyton's name.
Because he knew, Bennett explained, that if he said it, "you would become a reality I needed to face."
And face Peyton he did, as Bennett turned to look into a television screen to address Peyton, who appeared in court via video from the Erie County Prison for his sentencing on attempted homicide and other charges in the shooting.
Peyton pleaded guilty in January to the four most serious charges he faced in the Erie Bureau of Police investigation into the crime: first-degree felony counts of attempted homicide, aggravated assault and robbery; and to a second-degree felony count of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
Erie County Judge David Ridge sentenced Peyton to 15 to 50 years in prison, giving him consecutive standard-range sentences on the attempted homicide and robbery charges, which Chief Deputy District Attorney Jeremy Lightner argued were separate, serious crimes. The first-degree felony count of aggravated assault merged with the attempted homicide charge, and the sentence Peyton was given for the second-degree felony count of the charge was made concurrent to the lead charge.
Peyton was also sentenced Wednesday to concurrent prison terms and to pay fines and costs on his guilty pleas to misdemeanor counts of possession of a weapon and accidents involving damage to an attended vehicle, and to summary counts of driving without a license and careless driving.
Peyton, in his statements aired from prison, apologized to Bennett for his actions and "the mistake I made."
"Don't ever use the word mistake again," Ridge responded after Peyton's remarks, telling Peyton his actions that day weren't a mistake but serious criminal offenses.
Ridge said the situation up to, during and following the shooting was beyond his comprehension.
"I don't know how it came to this," he said.
Hit-and-run leads to shooting
Erie police said the shooting stemmed from a traffic accident along Interstate 79 a short time before the fateful encounter on Garfield Avenue.
Investigators wrote in case documents that Peyton told them during a police interview that he was driving north on I-79 on Feb. 27, 2023, when he got into a traffic accident with another vehicle. He said he then fled the crash scene because he didn't have a driver's license, and the driver of the other vehicle began following him, detectives wrote in Peyton's criminal complaint.
According to police, Peyton said the other vehicle continued to follow him until he stopped his vehicle on Garfield Avenue, off West 12th Street near the GetGo gas station and convenience store. He said there was a brief altercation with the other driver before Peyton produced a handgun and shot Bennett, whom police said was not armed, before fleeing, according to information in the complaint.
Lightner said in January that Peyton then took Bennett's cell phone, which had a photo of the license plate to Peyton's vehicle, in another attempt to avoid getting caught.
Erie police said investigators used surveillance video from security cameras in the area to identify the suspect's vehicle as a Jeep Patriot, and they traced the Jeep's movements from the shooting scene to an address on Cascade Street. Investigators said they took Peyton into custody from the residence and found guns when they served a search warrant on the residence.
Officers who responded to Garfield Avenue after the shooting was reported found Bennett seated in his vehicle, with his seatbelt still on. He was rushed to UPMC Hamot, where he underwent surgery, and he later continued treatment at a rehabilitation facility.
Second cell phone and the will to live
Lightner, in his remarks to the court, said Peyton's many actions that day showed that he just wanted to "get away from this." It was shown in his fleeing from the traffic accident, in sticking a gun in Bennett's face and robbing him of his cell phone after the two motorists stopped on Garfield Avenue, in firing a shot into Bennett's jaw at close range after getting the cell phone, in fleeing from the shooting scene, and in later hiding his vehicle and attempting to give the gun to someone else.
What Peyton underestimated, Lightner said, was Bennett's will to survive. Peyton also did not know that Bennett had a second cell phone, which he used to call 911 and alert the authorities of the shooting, he said.
"If Alex Peyton had his way, Kevin Bennett would be under the ground right now. That's what he wanted," Lightner said.
Bennett, 59, outlined what he has gone through since the shooting, and how he said Peyton's actions changed his life. He talked of the thousands of dollars of out-of-pocket expenses for his medical treatment, the many surgeries he underwent and still faces, the shaking of his right hand from nerve damage, the pain he fees when he wakes up every morning, and the shrapnel that remains in his body.
But when he looks in the mirror, Bennett said he sees not only scars but a survivor.
"I see someone who refused to quit," he said.
Contact Tim Hahn at thahn@timesnews.com. Follow him on X @ETNhahn.
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