A former Gary man was sentenced to 84 months in prison per a plea agreement reached in February for his role as the getaway driver in a 2010 murder-for-hire that killed a county witness.

Originally facing 120 to 150 months, Jamell Brooks signed a plea deal as an accessory after the fact. Federal prosecutors say high-ranking Sin City Deciples member Ronnie Major paid his brother-in-law and fellow member Antoine Gates to kill Jocelyn “Pie Face” Blair, 31, on Dec. 19, 2010. She was shot inside Coney Island Restaurant in Gary, the Post-Tribune previously reported.

Blair was a witness against Major in a 2008 Gary shooting. Major was convicted at a Lake County trial of battery in 2011 and released in 2012, records show.

Court records state that after Major reportedly put out a hit on Blair, a trio — Major, Gates and Michael Rivera — planned to get Blair at the Sin City Deciples Club at 8th Avenue and Virginia Street in Gary and take her to a hotel where Gates wanted another man to kill her.

But after leaving the Sin City Deciples Club, Rivera went in a car with Blair, while Gates and another man rode in Brooks’ car, to Coney Island on Broadway, court records show. Gates, who is Brooks’ stepfather, went inside, and the man said he heard seven or eight shots, according to court documents.

Gates returned to Brooks’ car and said he shot Blair in the head and had accidentally shot Rivera in the thigh, court records state.

According to court documents, Major reportedly gave Gates “10 stacks,” or $10,000, for Blair’s homicide. Gates is set to be sentenced June 26.

During Tuesday’s sentencing, U.S. District Judge Philip Simon said he will recommend that Brooks serve his sentence in a prison out-of-state and be required to receive drug and alcohol treatment as well as treatment for PTSD. Because of a learning disability, Brooks won’t be required to finish his GED, but Simon encouraged him to work on it at his own pace regardless.

Simon said he was “really distressed” reading Brooks’s presentencing documents, saying Brooks had been “done wrong” since the day he was born.

But no matter how bad his upbringing was, it didn’t excuse what he did, he said.

“This woman didn’t deserve to get killed like this. There are no words to describe it,” Simon said.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Toth said Brooks is a “smart, educated person” who got caught up in things he never would’ve been caught up in had he not been in the area.

“Now that he’s surrounded by family who values him, when he puts this behind him (by serving his sentence), he won’t be back in the system,” Toth said.

Brooks himself said he was misled by the people who were supposed to love him and that his past is “his worst nightmare.” He’s been suicidal, and he hopes the family of the woman Gates killed can forgive him eventually for the part he played in her death.

“I’m not a thug, I’m not a thief. I’m a husband and a good provider — I just need a chance,” Brooks said through tears.

Post-Tribune’s Meredith Colias-Pete contributed.

Michelle L. Quinn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.