By: Patti Weaver
(Stillwater, Okla.) — A Stillwater man with prior drug convictions, who told a police officer he is mentally ill, has been given a one-year jail term followed by six years of probation for stabbing a stranger with whom he reportedly had been fighting in a parking lot.
Gerry Gray, 59, who was released from prison five years ago, was sentenced in accordance with a plea bargain approved by District Judge Phillip Corley last week that included restitution, court records show.
Gray pleaded guilty last week to assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, court records show.
Gray was arrested by Stillwater Police Officer Chris Houston at 3:53 p.m. on the Friday before Memorial Day after “spontaneously stating something to the effect of ‘I stabbed the man, I stabbed the man,"” an affidavit said.
“Gray continued muttering statements about people picking on him. At one point, Gray said something to the effect of ‘I put it in his ribs’ He made statements about an individual striking him in the head and wrist with some sort of pole-like object,” but the officer could not see a head injury, only slightly torn skin on the top of his right wrist that was not bleeding, the affidavit said.
“As I was reading his rights per Miranda, I saw that he began crying. He continued to say he was tired of people picking on him,” the officer wrote in his affidavit.
“Gray said that he and the unknown individual got into a physical fight in the parking lot of Pop’s Detail Shop. He described the fight as ‘going for each other’s throats,"” the affidavit said.
“Gray said that the unknown individual began striking him in the head and his right wrist with the object,” described as a type of broomstick handle, the affidavit said.
“Gray said that after he was struck with the object, he ‘blacked out.’ The next thing he remembered is the unknown individual covered in blood. Later he said that he probably stabbed the individual,” who survived, the affidavit said.
“Gray had previously mentioned that he is schizophrenic and bi-polar and he tends to ‘black out’ when made angry. Gray made mention several times in the interview room that he would do his time for what he had done,” the affidavit said.
According to the Oklahoma Department of Corrections, Gray had previously been convicted in Payne County of:
* possession of cocaine and marijuana in Stillwater in 2010 for which he was given a 10-year prison term of which he served about four years;
* possession of cocaine in Stillwater in 2008 for which he was given a concurrent nine-year prison term of which he served about four years;
* first-degree burglary in Stillwater in 2008 for which he was given a concurrent nine-year prison term of which he served about four years;
* stolen property possession in Stillwater in 2009 for which he was given a concurrent four-year prison term of which he served about two years;
* drug possession in 1991 for which he was given a five-year probationary sentence.
Gray had been convicted in Kansas of drug possession and paroled in 2002, DOC records show.
