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NILES — A Niles man who led police on a chase into Cass County was sentenced to prison Monday in Berrien County Trial Court at the Niles courthouse.

Ryan Eugene Swartz, 50, of Niles, pleaded guilty to use of meth second offense, third degree fleeing and eluding and resisting and obstructing police and was sentenced to concurrent terms of 16 months to two years, 20 months to five years and 16 months to two years in prison. He must pay $338 in fines and costs.

     He has credit for no days served as he was on parole at the time of the incident. These concurrent prison terms are consecutive to any prison term he gets for violating his parole from a 2021 possession of meth prison sentence.

     The incident occurred July 12 in Niles Township. Swartz led police on a chase into Cass County with several police officers involved. He was found to have a BB gun and knife when he was stopped.

     “He ran a stop sign and through a crash scene, Berrien County Assistant Prosecutor Kate Arnold said. “He led police on a 30 minute chase into Cass County with multiple police agencies giving chase. Police discovered the weapons and that he was an absconder from parole when they stopped him. He clearly hasn’t learned anything.”

     Defense attorney Shayne Williams said Swartz has mental health issues and was not taking his medications at the time of the incident. “He’s told me that he’s looking forward to taking advantage of the prison programs,” she said. “He realizes that he’s going back to prison and he wants to use that time positively.”

     Swartz said he took responsibility for his actions. “I know it was reckless, I apologize to the officers,” he said.

     Berrien County Trial Court Judge Jennifer Smith said that if Swartz had gotten substance abuse treatment in the past but that it hadn’t had any effect if he had. “Until you’re ready to do that, you will be back,” she said. “Now that you recognize you have issues, it’s up to you to do something.”

     “You put a number of people in danger,” she added. “This was not your first go around, you had a fleeing and eluding in 2021 as well.”