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A homeless man who bit off a Venice coffee shop owner's fingertip was sentenced yesterday.
Jonathan Shain Lemmons, 31, pleaded no contest to one count of mayhem yesterday and was sentenced to two years in prison, according to a release from the L.A. County District Attorney’s Office.
On March 21, Lemmons was asked to leave Cow's End Cafe on Washington Blvd. in Venice by the shop's owner, Clabe Hartley. Hartley said that the Lemmons took someone's drink and was aggressively demanding money form his customers. The two got into a fight, and Hartley said Lemmons hit him several times in the face before they both ended up on the ground. Bystanders pulled Lemmons off of Hartley, but not before Hartley bit off the tip of Hartley's finger.
"To bite somebody is animalistic," Hartley said at the time. "Humans don't do that."
Doctors were not able to reattach Hartley's fingertip, and the wound requires 40 stitches plus a skin graft.