Plea hearing scheduled for Pieper Lewis over probation violation

DES MOINES, Iowa (WHO) — A plea hearing has been set in the probation violation case of 18-year-old Pieper Lewis.

Lewis appeared briefly in Polk County court Thursday morning for a pre-trial conference, where the judge set her plea hearing for March 9th.

Lewis was sentenced in September after pleading guilty to involuntary manslaughter and willful injury in the 2020 death of Zachary Brooks. She was 15 years old at the time of Brooks’ death and claimed she was a victim of sex trafficking and he had raped her repeatedly.

The judge in the case deferred the 20-year prison sentence in her conviction and sentenced her instead to five years of probation and 600 hours of community service. She was also ordered to pay $150,000 in restitution to Brooks’ family.

In November, police said Lewis cut off her tracking monitor and fled the Fresh Start Women’s Center in Des Moines. That’s where she’d been serving her sentence. She was taken back into custody a few days later and booked into the Polk County Jail.

Details of the plea offered to Lewis have not been released.

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