 The covid-19 vaccine and flu vaccine are different and it's safe to get both vaccines at the same time so don't hesitate. Vaccinate the Pike County Health Department reminds you that the strongest defense is vaccination against flu and covid. After being accused in 2018 of improper sexual contact with a 16-year-old, Pike County resident Joshua Hubbard was sentenced Monday to 10 years behind Thursday, Mountain Top spoke with Commonwealth Attorney Bill Sloan about the trial. This took almost four years to get this case to trial and that is not acceptable for us. However, in the beginning it takes a long time to get DNA evidence. This case could not have been prosecuted without the DNA evidence. It would have been a he said he said case and it would be very difficult for a jury to find the unreasonable doubt guilt in a manner like that. To convict Sloan says they had to wait for DNA evidence during the pandemic and that additional factors such as the death of Judge Combs and Hubbard's transitioning to different attorneys delayed the case. We're not happy about how long it took but if we know during a pandemic we had no court tried no cases for nearly two years. We could do some things like we can have hearings things like that through zoom but in order to have a trial you got to bring 50-60 people in a courtroom to pick your jury from. In 2008 Hubbard was the subject of a separate sodomy case where he was sentenced to five years and due to being an active PFO persistent felony offender prosecutors enhanced him with a classy felony. His supervision ended less than five years ago so we could use that case and to enhance the present case because of the PFO of persistent felony offender statutes. He was a classified as a PFO second degree which merely raises the punishment from the Class D felony which is the original charge the sodomy charge is Class D raises it to a Class C which the punishment for that is five to ten years. The jury in this case appropriately sentenced him to the maximum of ten-year sentence. Following the trial Mountain Top had the opportunity to speak with Spencer Hensley about the case. It means you got one less predator on the street to attack another kid. I mean I had once this all unfolded quite a few other people came to me telling me their stories of what had happened but that was never proven and yes I was very glad of this outcome because like I said he walked free for four years for a crime that most people would have got punched with right away. Hubbard is currently being held in the Pike County Detention Center without bond. For Mountain Top News, I'm Joel Hodgeall.