Trumbull capital murder trial to proceed Aug. 28

Staff report

WARREN

Judge Andrew Logan of Trumbull County Common Pleas Court ruled one murder suspect is competent to stand trial Aug. 28 and one competent to be evaluated again.

The judge’s ruling Tuesday that David Martin is able to understand criminal proceedings and aid in his defense means his murder trial will take place starting Aug. 28.

It will take a week or so to pick a jury and then testimony will begin in a trial that will determine whether Martin, 29, originally from Cleveland, should get the death penalty for purportedly killing Jeremy Cole, 21, and wounding a woman at a house on Oak Street Southwest in October 2012.

Martin is being housed in Mahoning County jail as a result of him being accused of being one of three men who took a Trumbull County jail corrections officer hostage for five hours in April.

Judge Logan also ruled that Royce Honaker, 60, of Southington, has been restored to competency to stand trial in the death of his wife, Donna, 58, in their home in July 2013.

Honaker, of Countyline Turnpike Road, was taken to the state mental hospital in Massillon for evaluation of his mental-health issues after he refused to be evaluated while he was locked up in the county jail.

Honaker’s attorney asked earlier that Honaker be evaluated to determine whether he is not guilty by reason of insanity, meaning he was not sane at the time his wife died.

The next step will be to have Dr. Thomas G. Gazley, a psychologist with the Forensic Diagnostic Center in Austintown, evaluate Honaker to advise the court on that matter.

In another murder case, Judge Logan has taken under advisement the reports of three mental-health experts that disagree with each other on whether Patrick Heltzel, 20, of Atlantic Street Northeast was sane at the time he is alleged to have killed Milton A. Grumbling III, 71, at Grumbling’s house on Kincaid East Road in Warren Township.