Trial date set for Southington man charged with killing his wife

WARREN — Royce Honaker, 63, will be tried by a judge without a jury Nov. 9 in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court in the 2013 shooting death of his wife in their Southington home.

Judge Andrew Logan set the trial date today during a pretrial hearing.

Honaker was sent to a state mental hospital in 2014 but returned to the county jail over the summer after he was deemed competent to stand trial. Another evaluation was conducted this spring, but the results are not public.

Police said Honaker called 911 on July 31, 2013, to say he had just killed his wife, Donna, 58, at their home on Countyline Turnpike Road. He was standing near the garage when police arrived and repeated the statement, police said.