MANSFIELD, Ohio — An Ohio man who killed his mother and cut out her heart in 1981 was back in court Monday for a hearing in a separate assault case.
The Mansfield News Journal reported that Charles Eric McKinley, 60, was in court for a hearing to determine his placement after completing a prison sentence for assaulting two nursing staff members at Heartland Behavioral Health in Massillon in 2004. McKinley, who was a patient at the facility, was convicted in 2007 of felonious assault and sentenced to 15 years in prison.
His sentence is set to end Sunday, the newspaper reported.
McKinley, who wore a mask and a striped prison uniform during his hearing, appeared frustrated in court, according to the paper.
“Just get me off,” he told his attorney. “I’ve done enough time.”
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McKinley was initially committed to a psychiatric hospital after being found not guilty by reason of insanity in the fatal stabbing of his mother, Tiney McKinley, 47, in her Mansfield home on Jan. 14, 1981.
Retired Common Pleas Judge James Henson, who presided over McKinley’s murder trial, previously described the case as one of the most memorable of his career.
“Charlie McKinley was staying at the YMCA,” Henson said, according to the News Journal. "He got the idea that his mother was the devil’s consort.
“He thought if he killed his mother, the devil would commit suicide or be killed by the police. When the police got there, he was holding her heart in his hand.”
News Journal stories from 1981 indicate that Tiney McKinley called police shortly before 2 p.m. the day of her death and said she was “having trouble” with her 20-year-old son. When officers arrived at her house, Charles McKinley came to the door brandishing one of the multiple knives he’d used to kill her.
Charles McKinley was also accused of cutting the daughter of an acquaintance just before he walked the three blocks to his mother’s house. He had stayed with the woman overnight and was refusing to leave, so she called her daughter to come and help her.
The daughter was slashed on the hand, requiring several stitches, the newspaper reported.
McKinley was indicted in March 1981 on charges of murder and felonious assault. At that time, he had been found incompetent to stand trial and was hospitalized at Lima State Hospital.
He showed signs of paranoid schizophrenia, but it was determined that he could become competent to stand trial with proper treatment. He had previously been diagnosed with schizophrenia following a three-week hospital stay in 1979, news reports said.
McKinley was found competent to stand trial and Henson found him not guilty by reason of insanity during a 45-minute bench trial held Nov. 9, 1981, according to the News Journal.
McKinley escaped from a mental hospital near Cleveland in 1987. He was recaptured about two weeks later at a motel in Birmingham, Alabama.
He was indicted in January 2004 on the two assault charges stemming from the attacks on nurses at Heartland Behavioral Health. Initially deemed incompetent to stand trial, McKinley’s trial on the charges didn’t take place until two years later.
He was sent to prison in June 2006, court records show.
A judge on Monday ordered a mental evaluation for McKinley to determine where to send him next, the News Journal reported. Under the terms of his commitment, he is required to undergo evaluations every two years.
Richland County Common Pleas Judge Phil Naumoff said in court, however, that McKinley had not undergone a mental evaluation since his incarceration began.
Prosecutors recommended he be sent to Twin Valley Behavioral Healthcare in Columbus while awaiting the evaluation.
McKinley was not pleased with the outcome of the hearing, the newspaper reported.
“Forty years … 40 years,” he told his attorney. “That’s bull(expletive).”
Cox Media Group
