Update: Santa Rosa Man Accused of Stabbing Foster Father Will Receive Psychiatric Exam

Micah Leroy Hughes, 20, is charged with stabbing 51-year-old Mitchell Davis 10 to 12 times in a vehicle at Santa Rosa Avenue and Todd Road in unincorporated Sonoma County around 7:15 p.m. Saturday.

Hughes did not enter a plea to an attempted murder charge and will return to court Friday morning.

Hughes' grandmother Joy Hughes said this afternoon that Davis and his wife, Linda, were her grandson's guardians.

Rohnert Park police arrested Hughes for the stabbing around 8:45 p.m. Monday.

Sgt. Mike Bates said police received an anonymous tip that Hughes was seen wandering around Benicia Park in Rohnert Park and found him sitting on a knoll near the Boys and Girls Club of Rohnert Park on Santa Barbara Avenue.

Hughes is being held in Sonoma County Jail in lieu of $1 million bail.

Joy Hughes said her grandson was diagnosed as mentally ill when he was 3 years old. She said he was 4 years old when he was first placed in an involuntary, 72-hour hold for observation in a hospital because he was a danger to himself and others.

As a child, Micah Hughes was strong and violent and hurt other children in their Santa Rosa neighborhood, his grandmother said. She said she feared the children's parents would harm her grandson.

There were many other 72-hour holds for observation over the years, she said.

"We begged them to do something but he always was released," Joy Hughes said. "They told us we would be doing this for the rest of our lives. The county does not have a psychiatric hospital."

She said she relinquished care of her grandson to Mitchell Davis when he was seven years old because she had difficulty dealing with his mental illness. At the time, Davis knew her grandson from a children's treatment center, she said.

Her grandson did not like taking his medication, she said. Hughes' stepsister said he would watch violent videos and listen to music with violent lyrics. He would not eat or bathe, she said.

"He was not functioning as a person," she said.

Joy Hughes said she wanted to bring her grandson to a hospital or the sheriff's office Sunday but that he said he was not ready. Micah Hughes was staying with a family friend in Cotati after the stabbing, she said.

Hughes and his stepsister, who have the same mother, were allegedly sexually assaulted by the same man when they were children, according to Joy Hughes.

Micah Hughes' sister and grandmother said they believe he stabbed Mitchell because he thought he was the man who had assaulted them in their
youth.

"He said, 'I did it for you,'" Hughes' sister said.

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