Third man charged in McHenry shooting after Prairie Ridge game pleads guilty, gets 10 years in prison

The third and final man charged in a shootout at a McHenry intersection that left behind almost 50 shell casings pleaded guilty Thursday to aggravated discharge of a firearm and was sentenced to 10 years in prison.

In exchange for the guilty plea, additional charges filed against Deontae Wade of Waukegan were dismissed, including attempted first-degree murder, a Class X felony that could have sent him to prison for up to 30 years.

He is required to serve 85% of his sentence and will receive credit for 692 days in the McHenry County jail, Judge Mark Gerhardt said.

In his plea, Wade, 28, admitted to “knowingly” discharging a firearm in the direction of another vehicle – a Jeep Compass – according to the indictment.

Assistant State’s Attorney Ashur Youash said in court Thursday that Wade was a passenger in the vehicle when shots were fired at the Compass, which was occupied by Dante L. Terrell, 31, of Zion.

Prosecutors have said that either Wade or another person in the vehicle initiated the shooting, and Terrell was returning fire.

Prosecutors allege that the shooting occurred when Terrell was driving away from a football game at Prairie Ridge High School in Crystal Lake and another vehicle, a Nissan Maxima in which Wade was an occupant, approached the intersection.

At a hearing last March during which Terrell entered a guilty plea to an amended charge of attempted aggravated discharge of a firearm and was sentenced to seven years in prison, Terrell “maintained that he was returning fire,” said Jim Newman, then an assistant state’s attorney. “He was pursued by a vehicle who shot first, and he returned fire in self-defense.”

Also charged in the shooting was Davontae Newkum, 27, of North Chicago.

Newkum pleaded guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm as part of a negotiated plea and was sentenced to seven years in prison, court records show.

Additional, more serious charges also were dismissed in Newkum’s case, including aggravated discharge of a firearm at an occupied vehicle and unlawful use of a weapon, according to documents.

Newkum, who has a Lake County conviction on his record from 2016, was accused of bringing an “AR-15-style pistol” to the high school that day and later shooting at the Nissan Maxima, court records show.