photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Coby Allen Gore Holland appears at his sentencing with his attorney, Jessica Glendening, Tuesday, Sept. 9, 2025, in Douglas County District Court.

A man who critically injured another man after drunkenly shooting him in a car full of people received a one-year prison sentence Tuesday, which was suspended to two years of probation, and will have to pay the victim more than $6,000 in restitution.

The defendant, Coby Allen Gore Holland, 22, pleaded no contest to aggravated battery for the Feb. 19 incident in which he pulled a Glock-style handgun and accidentally — but “recklessly” by his own account — shot a 23-year-old in a Kia Optima full of seven people.

Gore Holland had reportedly consumed six shots of whisky at a Lawrence pool hall prior to the shooting, which damaged the victim’s stomach, liver, spleen and spine, requiring several surgeries.

“He was my best friend,” Gore Holland said of the victim Tuesday as he offered his apologies to the court. “I was just being very reckless.”

Gore Holland had no prior criminal history that would affect his sentence under state guidelines, and the parties had agreed for there to be no finding that a gun was involved in the shooting, which would have triggered Special Rule 1, which presumes a prison sentence if a defendant uses a firearm in commission of a person felony.

At the plea hearing in July, prosecutor Adam Carey, said the victim was severely injured not by a gun, but by “an inherently dangerous item or object” — to support the legal fiction that a gun wasn’t used.

Carey told Judge Amy Hanley that the plea deal was fully supported by the victim, who did not appear at the sentencing.

Gore Holland will have 24 months to pay $6,244 in restitution to the victim at the rate of $261 per month. Hanley waived his court costs and fees, noting Gore Holland’s present lack of income and saying that restitution should be the priority. She ordered him to obtain employment, to get a substance abuse evaluation and to abstain from alcohol and illegal drugs, among other probation conditions.

She expressed the hope that Gore Holland would hang on to the memory of what he had done and “to push yourself to do better.”

As a convicted felon, Gore Holland will be prohibited from possessing any firearms in the future.