In house once filled with life, stabbing tears family apart

A brother-on-brother slaying has brought nothing but sadness to a Warren family.

By TIM YOVICH

VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF

WARREN — Jeffrey Smith’s eyes well with tears as he reflects on how the stabbing death of a brother at the hands of another brother could have been prevented.

If only tough love had been the early rule within the family dynamics, Smith says, his 29-year-old brother, Carl, would be alive and his 46-year-old brother, Charles, or “Chuck,” would not be jailed for the death.

“He’s nothing to me now,” Jeffrey said of his older brother. He refers to him as “The Murderer.”

Jeffrey said he sure doesn’t want to see him again.

“There’s emptiness” in the one-time family home on Kinsman Street on the northwest end, he said. “It used to be so full of life. It was always a good place to be, but all the life got sucked out of it.”

Jeffrey, 44, said Chuck’s addiction to crack cocaine and alcohol finally caused their mother, Lanell Smith, to throw him out. Chuck’s desire to remain home festered to the point where he “snapped,” leading to Carl’s death.

Jeffrey had moved back into the Kinsman Street house with his mother, because he was separated from his wife. Chuck, too, was living in the family home along with 29-year-old Carl, Carl’s 13-year-old son Derrick and Lanell.

Another brother, James, had died of a heart attack in the late 1990s. The youngest, 28-year-old Danny, lives in Florida. There are also three sisters in the area.

Comfort and space

It was a comfortable home with plenty of space, Jeffrey said.

The problem brother was always Chuck, he said, calling attention to the older brother’s addiction to drugs and alcohol and his coming and going as he pleased.

If Chuck got any money, Jeffrey remembers, he would “disappear for a few days” and return home broke.

Their mother worked with Chuck, taking him to doctors, and finally got him a $400-a-month disability check because of his addictions. Jeffrey said his mother, besides working a job herself, had given her all to get Chuck a regular income so he could become independent and out of the house.

But when Chuck got his monthly check, his friends would show up at the house, leave and come back after his money was gone, Jeffrey said.

Jeffrey and Carl would give their mother rent money, but Chuck never did.

“We tried to help him. We’d tell him there was a better way of life. He just wouldn’t listen,” Jeffrey explained of the family’s effort to help Chuck.

He said the household, even their mother somewhat, came to resent Chuck as he would return home “a total wreck” and sleep and watch television the rest of the time.

This went on for about a year, during which the resentment was becoming more defined.

Derrick, Carl’s son, was able to deal with the family’s dynamics. “He’s a good kid. He is a smart kid — gifted. He took after his father,” Jeffrey said, noting Carl had completed studies at New Castle School of Trades and was on his way to becoming an electrician.

Those negative feelings about Chuck and his lifestyle came to a head April 13, the day before Carl died.

Chuck received an additional $1,800 government check. Jeffrey said that he and his mother tried to persuade Chuck to bank, not cash, the check. The pleas went unheeded.

“I’ll be all right,” Jeffrey said Chuck told them.

Broke again

When Chuck returned home the next day, April 14, he was again broke, Jeffrey said, and tried to borrow $5 each from him and Carl.

When their mother came home, Chuck told her he had lost the money. “She put her foot down and told him to leave,” Jeffrey recalled.

It was about midnight. Chuck was on the first-floor couch, and their mother went upstairs to her bedroom for the night.

Jeffrey said he and Carl were in an upstairs room playing cards and watching TV. Carl then decided to go downstairs to get a sandwich.

After hearing a rumbling sound downstairs, Jeffrey said, he went to find out what was going on. The lights were turned off and he couldn’t see very much.

Looking around, Jeffrey spotted Carl on his feet, backing up. “He attacked me,” Jeffrey said Carl told him.

“I didn’t know he was stabbed. I thought he was having a heart attack,” Jeffrey said.

Jeffrey described how Carl fell to his knees and then to the floor. Jeffrey called 911 but his brother was dead. Chuck didn’t say a word.

Jeffrey maintains that if Carl had any warning, he could have fended off Chuck and wouldn’t have been stabbed. “Carl didn’t have a chance,” he said.

Chuck pleaded guilty in July to voluntary manslaughter and was sentenced to six months in the Trumbull County Jail, where he remains. He was also ordered to undergo substance abuse counseling.

No choice

Jeffrey said the family had agreed to the plea agreement, and that they had no choice. The prosecutor’s office told the family, Jeffrey said, that since there were no witnesses to the stabbing, Chuck “could walk” if his case went to trial.

Chuck had been able to remain at home for so long, his brother said, because the family bond overshadowed his substance abuse. He just “snapped” when confronted with the reality of being kicked out, his brother said.

“We should have kicked him out the first time so he couldn’t have taken advantage of his family,” Jeffrey said.

“Don’t turn your back on the problem,” he warns families in similar situations.

The once joyful house is no more.

Derrick, Carl’s son, moved out the day his father died; he’s now living with his mother.

Jeffrey and Lanell also moved out of the house on Kinsman to another in Warren because of the sad memories.

“It hurt her pretty bad,” Jeffrey said. “She has faith in God, though.”

Jeffrey has been laid off from his job and has been able to pick up only odd jobs. He will soon be moving to the Carolinas or Florida to find steady work.

Lanell won’t be alone, though. She has three daughters living in the area to look after her.

yovich@vindy.com