A Portersville man serving an 18- to 20-year state prison sentence for the shooting death of a friend in 2014 wants his sentence vacated and a new trial.

Through his attorney, Jeremy Daniel Sickenberger, 30, is seeking post conviction relief, arguing ineffective assistance of counsel.

At a 2016 Common Pleas Court trial, a jury convicted Sickenberger of third-degree murder for killing Thomas “T.J.” Stockman, who died after Sickenberger shot him in the side of the chest with a .22-caliber rifle in the living room of Sickenberger's mobile home on Robbie Way on April 17, 2014.

State police said Sickenberger and the victim were “horsing around” while watching a movie that night. Sickenberger retrieved the rifle from his room, came back to the living room, put the barrel of the gun to the side of Stockman's chest and pulled the trigger.

Sickenberger has claimed that the shooting was accidental, that he did not know the gun was loaded and denied pulling the trigger.

Sickenberger’s attorney, Marco Attisano, claims Public Defender Joseph Leonard Smith failed to request that Common Pleas Court Judge William Shaffer present “mistake of fact” instructions to the jury, failed to investigate whether Sickenberger had autistic spectrum disorder and failed to object to state police testimony that the defendant lacked remorse.

Oral arguments were made Thursday before Judge Kelley T. Streib, who is presiding over the case. Shaffer is now a senior judge.

Sickenberger participated in the hearing through video conferencing from the state prison in Pine Grove, Indiana County. He did not testify in the hearing.

Attisano questioned Smith about several trial matters, including his unsuccessful attempt to prevent prosecutors from entering the call to 911 that Sickenberger made following the shooting and an interview he gave to a television news station.

Smith said he tried to have that evidence excluded, but the judge allowed it to be used. He said he was concerned that the TV interview made Sickenberger look “like he was more concerned about other things than the death of a friend.”

In the interview, Sickenberger also gave a slightly different version of the shooting than he gave police, Smith said.

“Obviously, Jeremy shouldn’t have talked. That was foolish of him,” Smith said.

He said he tried to have all statements Sickenebrger made excluded from evidence, and then tried to mitigate the weight of those statements in his closing argument.

A trooper who interviewed Sickenberger testified that the defendant shed a tear, but otherwise didn’t express remorse about Stockman’s death. Attisano asked Smith why he didn’t object to that testimony.

“I didn’t want to draw attention to it,” Smith said.

In addition, Sickenberger accepted responsibility for the shooting, and character witnesses testified on his behalf, he said. Sickenebrger did not testify at the trial, Smith added.

He said he asked the jury to find Sickenberger guilty of involuntary manslaughter after arguing that the shooting was accidental, and the result of recklessness and gross negligence. Sickenberger did not act with malice, Smith said.

Regarding his autism argument, Attisano asked why the defendant wasn’t evaluated to determine if he has autism.

Smith said a mental health evaluation was conducted, but nothing in the report indicated that Sickenberger should be evaluated for competency to participate in the trial.

“We believed he was competent,” Smith said.

He said it was reported by Sickenberger’s mother that he had autism and he had concerns about telling the jury he had autism.

He said he doesn’t believe autism is an accepted legal defense in a homicide trial.

The mental health evaluation found Sickenberger had attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, he said.

Smith said the defense called a firearm expert who testified that the shooting was accidental because that argument was able to be proven.

Under cross examination by assistant District Attorney Laura Pitchford, Smith said there was testimony that Sickenberger retrieved the gun, didn’t check to see if it was loaded and fired it.

He said Sickenberger was adamant that he didn’t pull the trigger. The gun discharged due to an anomaly, he said.

Smith, a member of the Butler County Behavioral Health Board, said Sickenberger participated in preparing his trial defense. Sickenberger attended all hearings, met with defense attorneys in prison, took part in discussions about entering a plea and maintained that he didn’t murder his friend, he said.

Smith said he and fellow Public Defender Kimberly Hudak encouraged Sickenberger to accept an offer from prosecutors to serve a 10- to 20-year prison sentence if he pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter.

“We really advised him to take that offer,” Smith said. He added that the defendant had already served at least 26 months in prison at that point and he could have been given credit for serving that time. Sickenberger declined the offer, saying it contained to much time in prison, he said.

He said Sickenberger graduated from high school and, at the time of the shooting, had a job and was not receiving any mental health services.

“We had no reason to believe he wasn’t a fully functional member of society,” Smith said.

During Sickenberger’s incarceration, he was not disciplined for misconduct and managed to cope with prison life, he said.

Smith said he would have risked offending the jury if had presented autism as a defense.

“I had no actual diagnosis of autism,” Smith said.

He said he tried to mitigate the impact of Sickerman’s TV interview, which was done two days after the shooting, by arguing that he was still in shock.

Streib didn’t issue a ruling on the Post Conviction Relief Act motion. She gave the attorneys 60 days to file briefs.