Transient man pleads guilty to threatening 2 people with a knife in incidents at Community Building and Kansas Union

photo by: Douglas County Sheriff's Office

Shaun Donovan Bernie

A man pleaded guilty Wednesday in Douglas County District Court to threatening two people with a knife: a woman at the Community Building and a man on the University of Kansas campus.

Shaun Donovan Bernie, 30, whose address is listed as a Lawrence drop-in center for people experiencing homelessness, entered into a plea agreement Wednesday to resolve three pending cases and to prevent a fourth from being filed against him.

Bernie pleaded guilty to two felony counts of aggravated assault with a knife. The first assault occurred on Nov. 9, 2022. Assistant District Attorney Samantha Foster said that a man was unlocking his bicycle from the rack at the Kansas Union, 1301 Jayhawk Blvd., when he looked behind him and saw Bernie standing on a bench. Bernie asked the man what he was looking at and showed the man a knife. The man told police that he thought Bernie was going to kill him, Foster said.

The second assault took place at the Community Building, 115 W. 11th St., on Jan. 7, 2023, when Bernie threatened a woman with a knife on the basketball court, as the Journal-World reported. Foster said that Bernie was in a relationship with a woman that had recently ended and that he approached the woman saying that she was “going to die today” and showing her a knife.

During Bernie’s plea hearing on Wednesday, Judge Amy Hanley said that Bernie faced between 11 and 34 months for the felonies and that he would be required to register as a violent offender for 15 years; his plea agreement stipulates that he will not file a motion to depart from a prison sentence in favor of probation.

As part of Bernie’s plea agreement, Foster said that the state would dismiss additional charges for misdemeanor theft and intimidation of a witness and that the state would not pursue a new case that alleged aggravated battery.

After the hearing, Bernie was returned to the Douglas County Jail, where he has been held on a $10,000 cash or surety bond since his arrest in January. He is scheduled to be sentenced on May 25.