Man convicted of attempted murder

By Daniel Pepper
Staff Writer

An Allegan County jury convicted Aaron Clarence-Eugene Summitt of attempting to murder Saugatuck resident Scott Eilbes.

Summitt, 30, of Ganges Township was arrested in October 2007 and charged with attempted murder, armed robbery and using a firearm to commit a felony. Police and prosecutors alleged he shot Eilbes, 44, during a robbery in the area behind the Saugatuck Center for the Arts on Griffith Street. Eilbes operated a Saugatuck bed and breakfast before he was injured.

The jury of nine men and three women convicted Summitt Tuesday, July 15, after a trial in circuit court. They found him guilty of attempted murder and felony firearms charges but found him not guilty of armed robbery.

During the trial, Summitt’s attorneys presented their defense only to some of the charges, admitting that Summitt had shot Eilbes, but claiming it wasn’t attempted murder. They asserted it was assault with intent to commit great bodily harm. Attorney William Fette argued Summitt had shot Eilbes in reaction to sexual advances.

“He said he was fearful because the guy was making homosexual advances, and (Summitt) was homophobic,” Fette said. “That doesn’t excuse it, but it will be very difficult to show that it was assault with intent to murder.”

Fette said that the fact that Summitt shot Eilbes once and didn’t try to shoot him again showed that he wasn’t trying to commit murder.

“He shot him only once,” Fette said. “He could have shot him again, but he didn’t.”

Allegan County assistant prosecutor Margaret Bakker tried the case for the state. Bakker argued that presenting the crime as self-defense made no sense.

“When you shoot someone in the back, how can it be self-defense?” she said. “An unarmed, intoxicated man in downtown Saugatuck?”

Eilbes testified Monday, July 14, that he’d thrown an anniversary party for some friends earlier in the evening and that a group of people left the party and went to the Sand Bar while he stayed behind to help clean up.

Bakker asked him if he’d had a lot of cash on him and he testified he’d been carrying a lot of money because he’d bought many of the presents for the party and then been reimbursed.

When he arrived at the Sand Bar, Summitt was talking with the group, including his parents, Eilbes said.

Eilbes said he didn’t remember if he’d left the Sand Bar with Summitt, but said he was planning to walk to the White House Bistro, where his parents had gone, after leaving the Sand Bar.

“He said he had to get something from his truck, so I walked with him around past the White House,” Eilbes said.

Summitt, he said, then pulled the gun on him and demanded money. Eilbes said he grabbed the gun.

“I grabbed it and I held it above his head and asked him if he was nuts,” he said.

Then, Eilbes said, he realized he was losing the struggle, so he gave up and gave Summitt the cash he had in one pocket and then turned and ran.

Bakker asked him when he realized he’d been shot.

“When I felt it hit me in the back,” Eilbes said.

He said he ran to the White House and flopped onto the bar.

Eilbes said he’d lost 90 percent of the vision in one eye as a result of a stroke suffered either when he was shot, or during surgery. He’d required another surgery this year to repair his stomach muscles.

Bakker asked him if he’d come on to Summitt.

“Do you recall making any type of sexual advance to the defendant?” she said.

Eilbes said he hadn’t.

On cross examination, Fette asked Eilbes why Summitt would say that he did.

Eilbes replied, “It’s an excuse.”

He also testified that Summitt could have seen that he had a large amount of cash on him when he was paying for his drinks at the Sand Bar.

During her closing argument, Bakker said Summitt had picked Eilbes as a person to rob.

Fette asked the jury to find reasonable doubt.

“I want you to think about the elements of the offense and reasonable doubt,” Fette said.

After the trial, Bakker said she was pleased with the guilty verdict on the attempted murder charge, which can be punished by up to life in prison.

She said the crime had shocked people in Saugatuck and Douglas.

“I was talking to one of the witnesses, not Scott, one of the others, and she said, ‘This really rocked our town,’” Bakker said. “It made all the business people and community members afraid. I think that’s what crime does.”

Summitt is scheduled for a sentencing hearing Friday, Aug. 29, at 9 a.m. in Allegan County Circuit Court.