Man who ambushed officers in Fort Mill to be sentenced Wednesday

The felon who said he would rather die than go back to prison before he shot a police officer in a 2014 ambush police were led into by the felon’s girlfriend faces up to life in prison Wednesday when he is sentenced in federal court.

Authorities say James William Lewis, 33, shot Charlotte officer Shane Page as officers with a federal task force tried to arrest Lewis in Fort Mill. Page survived but was shot in the shoulder, abdomen and pelvis after Lewis’ girlfriend lied to police repeatedly about whether or not Lewis was in her home.

Lewis signed a plea agreement Aug. 21, 2015, with federal prosecutors admitting that he shot Page on Jan. 7, 2014, federal court documents show.

Lewis, with previous convictions for car theft and drugs and robbery, faces anywhere from 25 years to life in prison after the sentencing set for Wednesday morning in front of Chief Judge Joseph Anderson. Lewis already is serving a nine-year sentence for the robbery of a Pineville, N.C, restaurant where he once worked.

Page, no longer in law enforcement, was part of a team seeking Lewis for the armed robbery of Jack in The Box just over the state line. Lewis, a former worker at the restaurant known as “Jesse” and “Phoenix,” held the employees captive and robbed the store. He was on the run for weeks before police found him.

Police believed Lewis was hiding with Kirstie Barratt, 23, the girlfriend, who lived with her parents in Fort Mill. Yet when questioned inside and outside the house, Barratt claimed Lewis was not there. When police heard a dog barking in a bedroom, Barratt went into the room and brought out the dog so police could search the room, not telling officers that Lewis was inside the room.

When Page and other officers attempted to search the bedroom, Lewis sprang from a corner and shot Page. Lewis was shot by Page and other police who returned fire.

Barratt and Lewis later admitted they had hatched a plot for Lewis to hide in the eaves of the home’s attic to avoid capture, but Lewis decided to shoot at officers trying to catch him.

Barratt was sentenced to two years in prison in December 2014 but was released in October and is on federal probation, according to Bureau of Prison officials.

This story was originally published January 18, 2016 at 3:35 PM with the headline "Man who ambushed officers in Fort Mill to be sentenced Wednesday."