Rape suspect found incompetent to stand trial

STAFF REPORT

YOUNGSTOWN — An 85-year-old Beaver Township man charged with raping a girl while she was 4 and 5 years old has been found incompetent to stand trial due to dementia and sent to a Cleveland psychiatric hospital.

After a Tuesday competency hearing, Judge Lou A. D’Apolito of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court sent Charles Vern Smith to Northcoast Behavioral Health Care Systems, where he will be treated for a year.

Based on a psychological evaluation report, the judge found Smith mentally ill, incapable of understanding the proceedings against him and unable to assist in his own defense.

Smith, of Columbiana-Canfield Road, is to undergo another evaluation several months from now, the judge said.

The offenses, for which a county grand jury indicted Smith in September, are alleged to have occurred at the child’s residence elsewhere in Beaver Township between Aug. 6, 2006, and June 11, 2008.

The accuser’s mother called township police to report that the girl made the allegations to her and that the girl identified Smith as her assailant, said Carl Frost, township police chief.

Conviction on any of the four rape counts Smith faces could bring a life prison sentence.