By NEAL WAGNER / Managing Editor

COLUMBIANA – A 57-year-old Alabaster man who pleaded guilty in 2016 to shooting a victim during a 2014 robbery in the city is back in the Shelby County Jail for the third time in as many years after he was rearrested on a firearm possession charge in late October.

The Alabaster Police Department arrested Sylvester Rhine, who lists an address on Seventh Place Southeast in Alabaster, on Oct. 21 and charged him with one count of probation violation, one felony count of being a felon in possession of a weapon and misdemeanor counts of attempting to elude law enforcement and resisting arrest.

His most recent charges came when he was allegedly found to be in possession of a firearm on Oct. 21 after having been convicted on a second-degree assault charge in 2016. He allegedly attempted to flee the officers who attempted to arrest him, and was combative while being brought into custody, according to his arrest warrants.

After Rhine pleaded guilty to the second-degree assault charge in 2016, he received a 15-year prison sentence, which was split between two years in the Alabama Penitentiary followed by three years of supervised probation. Rhine had 406 days of jail credit subtracted from his two-year prison sentence for time he has served in the Shelby County Jail since his Dec. 31, 2014, arrest.

According to indictments, Rhine shot a victim during a robbery off Fifth Avenue Southeast shortly after 10 a.m. on Dec. 30, 2014. The indictment said Rhine stole U.S. currency from the victim and shot the man, causing serious physical injury.

During the Dec. 30, 2014, incident, officers arrived on the scene and discovered a shooting occurred, but were unable to locate the victim or the suspect. The victim then appeared at the Shelby Baptist Medical Center emergency room about 20 minutes after the shooting suffering a gunshot wound to the hand, leading to Rhine’s arrest a day later.

When he was arrested on Oct. 21, he was still on probation for the second-degree assault charge, and currently is being held in the Shelby County Jail without bond as a result. He is set to appear in Shelby County District Court for a preliminary hearing on Nov. 9 at 8:30 a.m.