A Rome man who slashed his ex-girlfriend with a machete after she refused to take him back was sentenced to four decades behind bars.
Clifford Frederick Whatley, 32, pleaded guilty Wednesday in the August 2018 attack on Syveta Sewell, the Rome News-Tribune reported.
He was sentenced to 70 years, with 40 to serve in prison and the rest on probation.
Rome police said Whatley pulled a machete and slashed Sewell during an argument outside the Riverwood Park apartment they shared.
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Whatley attacked Sewell after she told him she was leaving him and taking her two children to a new home she bought, according to the newspaper.
Officers responding to the complex that night found a trail of blood leading to Sewell, who was badly injured, according to a police report. She was found sitting on a chair in her bathroom, fading in and out of consciousness, AJC.com previously reported.
She had a deep, four- to six-inch gash on her arm and her skull was visible through another wound on her head, police said. The woman’s arm was nearly severed in the attack.
Doctors said the 15-year Army veteran would have bled to death if she hadn’t gotten help when she did, the News-Tribune reported.
After the attack, Whatley left in Sewell’s car, authorities said. The vehicle was eventually recovered in Florida and U.S. Marshals tracked Whatley to a library in Texas.
Inside his backpack, they discovered the machete with Sewell’s DNA still on the blade, authorities said.
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Sewell said she’s still receiving treatment for the physical and emotional trauma she suffered that night, the newspaper reported.
“He did this to me while my children were home and left me to die with them,” Sewell said at Whatley’s sentencing hearing. “My life will never be the same.”
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