Mentally ill man committed 10 years

Roberts was diagnosed with schizophrenia and other personality disorders.
YOUNGSTOWN -- When Vincent Roberts, 33, hit his mother with a chair last year, he told his lawyer he thought he was hitting a robot.
Psychiatric evaluations of Roberts showed he was unable at that time to know the wrongfulness of his acts because of his mental illness.
Judge Maureen A. Sweeney of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court, after a brief trial before her Wednesday, ruled that Roberts, of Austintown, was innocent by reason of insanity, was mentally ill and subject to court-ordered hospitalization.
The judge ordered Roberts taken from the county jail to the Northcoast Behavioral Healthcare System's Northfield Campus in Cleveland, where he will kept for 10 years. Northcoast specializes in mental illness treatment.
Charged
Austintown police charged Roberts with attempted murder, felonious assault and two counts of aggravated burglary Oct. 4, 2004. Dawn P. Krueger, an assistant county prosecutor, said police came to an Austintown home and learned that Roberts had hit his mother with a chair.
Earlier that day, a counselor at Turning Point Counseling Services, which specializes in mental health treatment services, had advised Roberts' mother that her son should not be allowed to continue living at home. Roberts was in counseling at the facility.
Krueger told Judge Sweeney that Roberts got upset about the counselor making that recommendation.
Mrs. Roberts did not allow her son to continue living at their home. Roberts left, but he returned later, broke into the home and hit his mother with a chair, Krueger said.
Evaluated
A county grand jury indicted Roberts in November 2004, and a few weeks later, Atty. Martin Yavorcik, his lawyer, filed a plea of innocent by reason of insanity.
A doctor at Forensic Psychiatric Center of Northeast Ohio conducted a sanity evaluation for Roberts and determined that, among other things, Roberts suffered from schizophrenia and unspecified personality disorders.
Yavorcik said his client told him he believed his mother was a robot because when he hit "the thing" with the chair, oil came out. He didn't believe it was blood because it was too dark, Yavorcik said.
Diagnosed
Yavorcik said the psychiatric evaluation also showed Roberts experienced severe mental illness at the time of the attack and lacked the capacity to assess and properly weigh alternatives or make decisions based on reality.
Judge Sweeney ruled that because of the presence of severe mental disease symptoms, Roberts did not know his actions were wrong.
The judge ruled the 10-year commitment to Northcoast is based on the maximum time of the most serious felony charge, which was attempted murder.
As required by law, Northcoast will make a report to the court on Roberts after the initial six months of treatment.