Trial Delayed in Kent Stabbing Death

The trial for a Kent man accused of stabbing another Kent man to death earlier this summer has been delayed in order to determine his sanity.

At a hearing this morning, Portage County Common Pleas Judge Laurie Pittman ordered a sanity evaluation for Leonard Armstrong, 49, of 112 Sherman St.

Late last month, Armstrong pleaded in the death of Jeffrey A. Sipes, 57, who was June 6.

Armstrong's trial on the murder charge was scheduled for a Sept. 2 pretrial hearing with his jury trial scheduled to start Sept. 13. But Pittman said the court-ordered sanity evaluations typically take 30 to 60 days to complete.

"So the Sept. 2 pretrial will not go forward," Pittman said.

Armstrong's court-appointed attorney, Frank Beane, told Pittman he had no objection to waiving his client's right to a speedy trial.

"In order to have ample time to cover all the bases," Beane said.

Armstrong appeared in court for the brief hearing wearing the standard-issue orange-and-white-striped smocks of the Portage County jail. Shackled and chained, he stood next to Beane while the attorneys addressed Pittman, but he said nothing.

Beane wrote in his not-guilty plea that his client is a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic and has been under psychiatric care since the age of 20 — for 29 years.

"According to Mr. Armstrong, his mental breakdown began when his wife left him," Beane wrote in the plea, submitted July 27. "It has also come to counsel's attention that Mr. Armstrong has been hospitalized more than six times due to mental breakdowns."

Prior to moving to Kent from New Jersey, Armstrong was a patient at two New Jersey mental health facilities, according to court records.

When he was arrested June 22, Armstrong was a client at Coleman Professional Services Behaviorial Health in Kent and Ravenna, which among its services provides mental health counseling to people with behaviorial problems or severe and persistent mental illness.

Portage County Assistant Prosecutor Thomas Buchanan said he expects additional delays in the case, as he just filed with the court and made available to Beane this morning five different video statements Armstrong gave to Kent police over four days following his arrest.

Beane is expected to file a motion to suppress Armstrong's recorded statements about Sipes' death to prevent them from becoming public before the trial.

Armstrong faces a minimum 15 years in prison on the murder charge, an unclassified felony, if found guilty. He is being held in the Portage County jail on a $1.5 million bond.