photo by: Douglas County Sheriff's Office

Anthony Duane Harris

A Topeka man entered a no contest plea on Thursday in connection with an incident on Thanksgiving Day in 2022 where he was alleged to have taken a cellphone from a woman and injured a man.

Anthony Duane Harris, 57, originally faced felony counts of robbery and aggravated assault and misdemeanor counts of criminal damage and battery for an incident on Nov. 24, 2022, according to charging documents. Harris allegedly approached a woman and her 10-year-old son near their residence in the 1600 block of Haskell Avenue and forcibly took the woman’s cell phone and prevented her from going inside her residence. The child was able to escape inside before a man in the residence came outside and confronted Harris; the man was injured during the confrontation, as the Journal-World previously reported.

On Thursday, Harris pleaded no contest to one count of aggravated battery as part of a plea agreement with the state. Senior Assistant District Attorney David Greenwald said that during the confrontation between Harris and the man who came from inside the residence, Harris picked up a large tree branch and struck the man in the face, breaking his nose.

Greenwald said that as part of the plea agreement, the remaining charges against Harris would be dismissed. He said that the state would recommend that Harris be given the standard sentence for the level-seven felony and that the state believed Harris’ criminal history was the highest possible on Kansas’ sentencing grid.

Harris’ defense attorney, Cooper Overstreet, said that he also believed that Harris’ criminal history was at the top end of the sentencing grid.

Judge Stacey Donovan accepted Harris’ plea and said that if the state and the defense attorney both agreed about Harris’ criminal history, Harris would face between 30 and 34 months in prison.

Donovan asked Harris if he had any questions for the court in regards to his plea or the court’s process.

“Can I go home?” Harris asked, laughing.

“I think you know the answer to that,” Donovan replied.

Donovan then scheduled Harris to be sentenced on May 11. Harris was then returned to the Douglas County Jail, where he had been in custody since his arrest on a $50,000 cash or surety bond.

According to the Kansas Department of Corrections, Harris has a criminal record going back to 1992, including multiple felony convictions for theft, burglary and drugs in Shawnee County, and dozens of disciplinary reports within the prison system.