A woman shot in the back was wobbly as she walked to the witness stand Wednesday. Since she was wounded in April 2018, her balance has never been the same, the woman told the court. She lives in fear that a bullet lodged in her back could shift, leading to paralysis.

As a result of the shooting, she suffered a collapsed lung and needed to be put on a chest tube while she fought to survive. Seven years later, she couldn’t run, if someone attacked her.

Larcel Lockhart, 28, of Hammond, signed a plea deal in March for aggravated battery. He faced up to 10 years in prison.

Judge Natalie Bokota sentenced him to six years in prison, one year in Lake County Community Corrections, and three years on probation. He said he wouldn’t appeal.

Officers responded around 10 a.m. April 1, 2018, to the 3400 block of Guthrie Street for a report of multiple shots fired, according to a probable cause affidavit.

The woman was sitting in a car with her boyfriend outside her apartment complex on Guthrie Street when they “heard a loud bang” and saw the “front passenger side window shatter,” followed by gunfire, the affidavit states.

Deputy Prosecutor Lindsey Lanham asked for 10 years — saying the couple were near an apartment and more people, besides the woman, could have been hurt.

Defense lawyer Lakeisha Murdaugh asked for three years in prison and the rest served in Lake County Community Corrections, saying Lockhart had changed since becoming a father in recent years.

It was “one the the stupidest things I’ve seen,” Judge Natalie Bokota said of the shooting, saying he would have to face the consequences of his part. However, she put in her order that Lockhart could petition to modify the prison part of his sentence.

Three men were originally charged in the case.

Co-defendant Mark Harrison III got seven years in prison and three years probation in January. Charges against Marzell Walden Jr., the alleged driver, were dropped in 2018.

The woman told police she saw a man walk from one side of a building to another, which she said she found “strange because nobody lived on the side of the building where the man came from,” according to the affidavit.

The woman was shot in her upper right back and was taken to St. Catherine Hospital in East Chicago, court records state. She had spinal and rib fractures, causing “difficulty with her lower right extremities.”

At the scene, officers found 32 spent shell casings from two different caliber weapons, records state.

Post-Tribune archives contributed.

mcolias@post-trib.com