photo by: Douglas County Sheriff’s Office

Jennifer Elaine Poeverlein

The state sought a four-year prison term for a probation violator who was convicted of severely beating another woman, but a Douglas County judge on Monday gave the defendant another chance at probation instead.

Jennifer Elaine Poeverlein was originally charged with aggravated robbery for a Sept. 26, 2025, incident, but pleaded guilty in February to the lower-level felony of reckless aggravated battery. In a sentencing memorandum filed with the court, prosecutor Cody Allen Smith said that prison was warranted because, considering Poeverlein’s criminal history score of “D” — on a scale of “A” to “I,” with “A” being the worst — her crime put her in a presumptive prison box on the state sentencing grid.

Smith said Poeverlein violently attacked the other woman after the woman had walked away following an argument. He said video showed Poeverlein throwing the woman to the ground by her hair and repeatedly punching her in the face. After a bystander intervened, Poeverlein took the other woman’s phone and punched her in the head. She then walked away but returned several more times to kick and stomp the woman’s head and to spit on her. The other woman remained passive throughout, Smith said.

That crime was committed while Poeverlein was on supervised probation in one case for misdemeanor battery and criminal damage to property and in a separate case for criminal damage to property. Smith said Poeverlein had violated terms of probation not solely by committing another crime but by failing to report to her probation officer and failing to obtain a substance abuse evaluation.

“The defendant is not availing herself of the opportunities offered to better herself and another chance at probation is unlikely to change her likelihood of success,” Smith wrote in the memorandum filed on March 18.

On Monday, he told Judge Stacey Donovan, “I still don’t believe she’s a good candidate for probation,” noting that she was still testing positive for marijuana in drug tests.

Poeverlein’s attorney, Hatem Chahine, was allowed by Donovan to file his motion for a sentencing departure under seal — meaning the document is kept secret from the public — but on Monday he told Donovan that Poeverlein had been doing well, had obtained full-time employment and a driver’s license, had completed outpatient treatment and begun therapy and had been law-abiding recently. He acknowledged that drug tests still showed marijuana in her system but said the levels were “going down.”

Poeverlein herself told Donovan that she was working, caring for her children and taking her medications for various mental health issues. She acknowledged that she had blown other chances she had been given, but said this time was different.

“I’ve never had a prison sentence sitting in front of me,” she said as around 10 of her supporters looked on from the gallery. “I’m trying to be a better member of society.”

Donovan, largely citing the reasons provided by the defense Monday, found substantial and compelling reasons to depart from a presumptive prison term and to give Poeverlein three years of probation instead, with an underlying sentence of 52 months should she violate the probation.

Poeverlein’s victim did not appear in court on Monday to make a statement, but Donovan ordered Poeverlein to write an apology to the woman. She also ordered her to pay just under $400 in various costs and fees and to complete an anger management course, among other conditions of probation.

Donovan told Poeverlein, as she has told other defendants, that it takes an average of seven chances for an addict to go through treatment and come out successful.

“You are not going to get seven chances,” Donovan said, suggesting that Poeverlein should regard the multiple chances she has already gotten as a “grace.”