The man arrested in connection with a deadly shooting in Blooming Grove Sunday morning was out on dangerously low bail following a nearly yearlong crime spree that has resulted in seven open criminal cases against him, including charges of felony domestic abuse, child neglect, narcotics possession, and bail jumping.
Trevon L. Adams, 29, faces a count of first degree intentional homicide in connection with the shooting death of a man at the Kwik Trip gas station in Blooming Grove. Adams fled the scene and led Maple Bluff Police officers on a high speed chase that ended when officers used spike strips to stop his SUV in Madison.
Adams has been in and out of prison for much of his life, as online court records show his first conviction in adult court was for felony battery by a prisoner a month after he turned 18 in 2010. This would indicate that he was incarcerated for a prior offense as a juvenile. Juvenile records are sealed in Wisconsin.
He was sentenced to two years' probation upon conviction of that battery, but a few months later he violated the terms of that probation when he was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct as a repeat offender. He was sentenced to two years in prison and two more of extended supervision on the prior battery by a prisoner count and nine additional months for the disorderly conduct.
However, while he was awaiting sentencing, he was arrested in June 2011 on one count of robbery with the use of force and two counts of battery, all as a repeat offender. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to one year in prison, but this sentence ran concurrently to the two years he was already set to serve. This means that he essentially received no prison time for a violent robbery.
Adams was released on $3,000 bond and, a month later, was arrested and charged with bail jumping. Amazingly, Dane County Court Commissioner Todd Meurer set cash bond at just $500 even though Adams faced a bail jumping charge and had been charged with a violent crime just a month earlier. Eventually, Adams was sentenced to 90 days in jail on the bail jumping count.
Six years later, Adams was charged with domestic abuse battery and disorderly conduct as a repeat offender, but Dane County Court Commissioner Jason Hanson allowed him out of jail on a $500 signature bond. Adams, who faced two violent crime-related misdemeanors and already had a bail jumping conviction on his record, only needed to sign his name to walk out of custody. He was eventually sentenced to 90 days in jail.
The following year, Adams was charged with theft of movable property and Court Commissioner Mario D. White freed him on a $500 signature bond. Adams pleaded guilty to the charge against him and was sentenced to 20 days in jail.
On February 25, 2021, Adams was charged with felony possession of narcotics but Dane County Court Commissioner Mark Fremgen allowed him out of custody on yet another $500 signature bond. While Adams was out on bond, he was arrested and charged on June 15 with domestic abuse battery and disorderly conduct. Rather than revoke his bond in the drug possession case or set a high bail to keep him in custody and prevent him from committing any more crimes, though, Court Commissioner Scott W. McAndrew freed him again on another $500 signature bond.
Unsurprisingly, Adams kept on committing crimes while he was out of custody. On August 5, he was charged with three counts of hit and run and one count of felony bail jumping. He was again before Commissioner McAndrew, and failed to show up for his initial court appearance on August 12, so a warrant was issued for his arrest.
A month later, Adams was arrested and on September 8 charged with a slew of crimes: Four felony counts and one misdemeanor count of child neglect, domestic abuse battery and disorderly conduct, resisting an officer, possession of drug paraphernalia, and misdemeanor bail jumping. In spite of these serious crimes committed while out on bail in two different open cases, Commissioner Jason Hanson set bond at just $250 per case.
Adams posted the following day and again left custody.
Five days later, a bench warrant was issued for him and he was taken back into custody and ordered to report to pretrial services for monitoring. Bond was again set at $250 per case and he again posted and left custody.
On October 11, online court records indicate that Adams committed a pretrial services violation and another bench warrant was issued. Exactly a month later, on November 11, Adams was charged with resisting an officer, fleeing or eluding an officer, and five felony counts of bail jumping. Stunningly, Commissioner McAndrew set bond at just $300. Online court records show Adams posted that $300 on November 18.
In his open child neglect and domestic abuse case, Court Commissioner David Conway increased bond to $400 per case, but court records show that Adams posted $150 cash on November 9 and another $150 cash on November 22.
Less than one week later, Adams allegedly shot and killed a man at a Kwik Trip in Blooming Grove.
Online court records indicate that all told, Adams paid a total of $1,100 in cash bond to repeatedly secure his release. Even though he had several open, serious, and violent criminal cases and had repeatedly been charged with misdemeanor and felony bail jumping, Dane County court commissioners continued to free him on dangerously low bail amounts
The issue of dangerously low bail is a contentious one in Wisconsin in the wake of the massacre at the Waukesha Christmas Parade, in which a violent criminal with multiple open felony cases was out on bail when he rammed his SUV into paradegoers, killing six people and injuring dozens more.
Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm promised an investigation into what he called the suspect's "inappropriately low" bail and claimed it to be an anomaly, but just yesterday "The Dan O'Donnell Show" discovered that a man charged in a deadly stabbing last week was out on bail following a prior stabbing over the summer that left a man seriously injured.