A New Castle man was cleared of charges that he drove a car into a group of people at a Slippery Rock Township apartment complex in 2019.

Judge Timothy McCune sentenced Joshua Klein, 25, Thursday to six months of probation with the first six days on house arrest, 40 hours of community service and $400 in fines for driving under the influence and resisting arrest. Klein pleaded guilty to the charges Sept. 8 in a plea deal in which his more serious charges related to driving into a crowd were dropped.

Klein's attorney, Kenneth Harris, said he was able to come to this deal with Assistant District Attorney Ben Simon after the facts in the case did not support the majority of the charges.

Simon couldn't be reached for comment.

On May 18, 2019, troopers learned that a crash occurred around 2:30 a.m. on Stillwater Lane in the parking lot of The Heights of Slippery Rock apartments. During a preliminary hearing, state police Trooper Casey Fuller recounted that he spoke to the victim, who was being treated by first responders for a broken nose, concussion and other injuries. Fuller recalled the victim was bleeding from his head and face. He was taken to Grove City Medical Center, and has since been released, Fuller said.

But Harris said the victim appeared to have been involved in a fight that night and there were no witnesses who said they saw Klein drive a car into the victim.

“My client was trying to leave a brawl,” Harris said. “I asked the trooper, 'Can these witnesses say that this victim was hit by my client?' No. Nobody can say that he was hit by a car. I just did my job and the facts are the facts.”

Harris noted that, “At first blush, you have a guy driving out of there and it looks bad, but once you look closer there was nothing there to support the charges.”

He added, “Facts are what caused this plea deal.”

During the preliminary hearing, Harris also questioned the sobriety of the witnesses and concluded the victim in the case could have received a concussion in the fight.

“There was a brawl, melee, where I'm sure a number of people who were injured left before the police arrived,” Harris said.

Ultimately, Harris said, prosecutors failed to prove that Klein hit anybody.