Insanity Plea for Stabbing Murder Suspect

A Kent man has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity after being charged with stabbing another Kent man to death earlier this summer.

Leonard Armstrong, 49, of 112 Sherman St., has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity in the death of Jeffrey A. Sipes, 57, who was June 6. Armstrong was indicted on a murder charge in Sipes' death in early July.

Armstrong's defense attorney, Frank Beane, wrote in his written 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."

Beane said in an interview this morning that he expects Portage County Common Pleas Court Judge Laurie Pittman will hold a hearing on the insanity plea soon and order an evaluation to determine Armstrong's sanity.

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.

Paranoid schizophrenia is a mental illness characterized by "mistaken beliefs (delusions) that one or more people are plotting against them or their loved ones. It is difficult or impossible for others to convince them that they are not the target of a plot," according to the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

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

Based on those reasons, Beane entered the not guilty by insanity plea, according to his two-page plea submission.

Armstrong's case is still scheduled for a Sept. 2 pre-trial hearing with his jury trial scheduled to start Sept. 13.

Portage County Prosecutor Vic Vigluicci previously declined to comment on the case and whether a plea deal was possible.

Beane said he just received the prosecution's evidence in the case Monday, including five different video statements Armstrong gave to Kent police over four days following his arrest.

He said he'll review Armstrong's statements and afterward decide whether to file a motion to suppress the statements and keep them from becoming public before or during the trial. when requested by Kent Patch.

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.