PORT ANGELES — An appeal will be considered after an enraged Walmart customer who threatened five people, including a 4-year-old boy, with a loaded handgun last summer was sentenced Thursday to 22 years in prison.
A Clallam County Superior Court jury convicted Teresa Nadine Dumdie of Port Angeles in December of four counts of second degree assault and one count of second degree assault of a child.
Clallam County Superior Court Judge George Wood handed down the sentence, which was lengthened because of the use of a handgun, a deputy prosecutor said.
Harry Gasnik, director of the Clallam County Public Defender’s Office, said an appeal will be considered.
Dumdie’s public defender, Loren Oakley, couldn’t be immediately reached for comment.
Sentence questioned
Gasnik said Oakley questioned in court Thursday the legality of a sentence that is beyond the 10-year maximum for second degree assault.
Angry about being admonished by a fellow customer as she lodged a complaint at Walmart on July 10, Dumdie had pointed a gun at three customers, including a child, and two employees, court documents said.
Dumdie, 38, had no prior criminal record.
Assault charges alone would have resulted in a sentence of seven years, a deputy prosecutor said, but the sentence was lengthened because of the use of a handgun.
“If a firearm is used in the crime, the Legislature has mandated 36 months for each count,” Deputy Prosecutor John Troberg said.
The three-year sentence extension for each count must be served consecutively and cannot be reduced through early release, he said. That means Dumdie will serve at least 15 years in prison.
Troberg said Dumdie appeared emotionless after the sentence was handed.
Incident started in the store
In July, Dumdie had approached a Walmart employee about being sold the wrong ammunition, police said.
After she began raising her voice, a customer told her to calm down and stop cursing in front of her child.
She received her refund and left the store after being escorted by Walmart employees. But before driving away, she grabbed a loaded .22-caliber handgun from her car and confronted the same customer who was about to leave the parking lot in a van, police said.
Dumdie pointed the gun at the three occupants of the van and threatened to kill the boy, a police probable cause statement said.
She also pointed the gun at two Walmart employees.
Police arrested her across U.S. Highway 101 from the store shortly after she drove around the parking lot and threatened the woman for a second time, according to court documents.
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Reporter Tom Callis can be reached at 360-417-3532 or at tom.callis@peninsuladailynews.com.