Judge schedules resentencing of Black riot defendant for July 30

Mark Hayward, The New Hampshire Union Leader, Manchester
·2 min read

Jun. 15—A Superior Court judge has set a July 30 date for the resentencing of Antwan Stroud, the young Black man initially sentenced to 30 days in jail for his role in the Black Lives Matter unrest on South Willow Street last year.

Judge William Delker threw out Stroud's sentence late last month after Stroud's lawyers raised issue with the fact that a White co-defendant received no jail time.

How could any defendant, Delker wrote last month, have confidence in the fairness of the criminal justice system when someone standing next to him during the entire criminal episode does no time behind bars "simply because the prosecutor decided to treat one man more harshly than the other?"

Delker has allowed two hours for the resentencing, an extraordinary amount of time for a sentencing hearing involving a first-time offense.

Meanwhile, the prosecutor in the case, Assistant County Attorney Tom Craig, has filed paperwork asking Delker to reconsider his decision to vacate the 30-day sentence.

In a nine-page filing, Craig seeks to differentiate as much as possible the actions of Stroud, who was 18 at the time of the crimes, and Kyle Toledo, 20.

Both were in the same crowd on South Willow Street during the unrest, Craig's filing says.

* Stroud urged a crowd to pull a police officer from an unmarked car and assault him, which prompted the officer to call for help. The crowd never touched him. Toledo made no such statements.

* Stroud filmed the incident and posted it on Facebook; Toledo did not.

* Stroud spit on the police car. Although Toledo was part of the crowd that surrounded the car, it's uncertain whether he spit.

* Stroud told Toledo to light a firework, which Toledo threw into a parking lot.

"The defendant's victim was (Manchester Police) Officer Mark Aquino. Toledo's victim was a parking lot," Craig wrote.

But Stroud's lawyers have filed papers questioning how someone who lit a firework and threw it could be more at fault than someone who encouraged him to do so.

Craig's characterizations of Stroud's behavior, the lawyers said, are "increasingly hyperbolic." They urged Delker to consider Craig's arguments at the resentencing, but not revisit his decision to vacate the sentence.