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Downtown jewelry shooter sentenced; victim 'not angry'

SEATTLE — Roberto Sandoval admits the shooting 11 months ago has left him a scarred man. "I'm not really the same anymore," he said. After all, he sprang into action and chased a jewelry thief several blocks past the Mayflower Hotel where he works as a doorman. As they wrestled, the thief pulled the trigger. "This scar right here and the bullet coming out right here," said Sandoval. "I mean, my life has changed."

Edmond Maynor was convicted of the heist at a jewelry store in the Westlake Shopping Center in downtown Seattle. At his sentencing, in a barely audible voice, Maynor told a Superior Court judge he never meant to shoot Sandoval. "I didn't mean for it to happen like this," he said. He was down on his luck and desperate, he said. And he had a message for him and his other victims. "I do apologize," he said.

A KIRO-TV reporter asked Sandoval if he is angry with Maynor. "No," he said. Sandoval insists he bears no ill will toward Maynor. "I'm angry in the moment because he shot me," he said. "But I forgot."

Sandoval returned to work at the Mayflower Hotel four months ago, and got a second job as a doorman at the Roosevelt Hotel. After being out of work for so long, he needs to work two jobs. And he can't do what he used to. "I am moving better," he said. "I can do a lot of things but not one hundred percent." Still, he says he is not unhappy. "I'm safe."

Maynor was sentenced to 41 years in prison. He will likely be in his 70s before he is a free man again.