NORWICH – A man found guilty by a jury of his peers was sentenced to state prison for his repeated alcohol abuse Friday.

Robert G. Niles of Bainbridge will spend the next two to six years in state prison for driving while intoxicated. He also has two prior DWI convictions from 1997 and 2002.

At sentencing, Defense Attorney Jeffrey Leibo and Niles both pleaded with the court for a lighter sentence, citing the fact Niles had just become a father.

“Come on, your honor -- she’ll be nearly five years old when I get out. Can’t something be done so I can be there?” asked Niles.

“If only we could look into the windows of your soul and see what kind of future you might have, but we can’t. We have already been down this road before without much change. Hopefully this will be that point of change,” Chenango County Court Judge W. Howard Sullivan said at sentencing.

This past July, after just an hour of deliberations, a jury found Niles guilty of driving while intoxicated (a class D felony) and driving under the influence of alcohol. The jury listened to testimony from three witness over two days.

Niles crashed his Toyota pick-up truck near his home on Corbin Road in Afton on Oct. 28 after drinking prior to the accident at his place of employment.