First day of testimony wraps up in trial of man accused of stabbing girlfriend 16 times

There doesn’t appear to be much, if any, dispute that Anthony Spicer stabbed his one-time girlfriend Ashley Warren 16 times about 11 p.m. on Feb. 22, 2013, and then led police on a nearly four-hour manhunt. He got on television and talked about it.

The question for the eight-woman, five man Whitley Circuit Court Jury empanelled Wednesday morning to decide Spicer’s fate is whether he is guilty of first-degree assault and criminal attempt to commit murder, or perhaps a lesser offense.
If convicted on both crimes, Spicer could receive up to 40 years in prison.

Commonwealth’s Attorney Allen Trimble began his opening statement about 1 p.m. Wednesday by showing a picture of a bloody Warren laying on the ground at the crime scene, which was located in the yard between 112 Skyview Drive and 114 Skyview Drive in Williamsburg.

"I want you to look at this picture that is what this case is about … a young mother laying there struggling for her life," Trimble noted.

At the time she didn’t know whether she would live or die from the 16 stab wounds she suffered or if she would ever be able to hold her three children again, Trimble noted.

Spicer, 30, and Warren, 32, had been together for about five or six years. They met in high school. They had a child together. Spicer moved out last October.

"But he continued to make problems for her," Trimble noted.

On the night of Feb. 22, Warren’s Emlyn home caught fire and burned while no one was home. The fire is unconnected to Spicer’s alleged crimes.

Both Spicer and Warren went to the fire scene and Warren agreed to give him a ride back to the residence, where he was staying with a friend, Vincent Lawson.

On the way there Warren saw a knife, which caused her great concern, Trimble told jurors during his opening statement.
When she stopped the car at Spicer’s residence, she got out of the car and ran.

"He ran after her. He tackled her and then began to repeatedly stab her," Trimble told jurors.

Spicer then ran and hid from police for the next four hours.

Authorities pinged his cell phone repeatedly in attempts to locate him and used police search dogs, which finally located him hiding under the bed in Lawson’s residence.

Lawson is charged with criminal facilitation to commit attempted murder and will be tried separately at a later time.
Jurors only heard from three witnesses Wednesday afternoon, including a 911 dispatcher, a reporter for the television station, which interviewed Spicer the morning of his arrest, and his neighbor, Betty Bundy, who saw Spicer stabbing Warren and frantically called 911.

Bundy testified that she lived next door to Spicer and heard something outside her residence on the night of Feb. 22.

"I heard a woman screaming, ‘Help! Help! Help!’" Bundy said, which prompted her to run outside, she testified. "I saw Ashley on the ground. Anthony was on his knees beside her. He was stabbing her. I was right beside them."

Bundy said she asked Spicer to stop stabbing Warren.

"It was like he was in a trance," Bundy noted adding that Warren was "begging him to stop."

"I said, ‘Anthony, don’t you love me.’ He stopped and looked up at me," Bundy testified.

Bundy said she then ran into her home to get her cell phone and went back outside. She then went around to Anthony’s back and got a hold of his sweatshirt.

Then he got up and left, she testified.

She called 911 around this time and turned her focus to Warren.

"I saw blood on her face. I just went hysterical screaming," Bundy testified.

She asked Warren if she wanted a blanket, and Warren told her, "tell my girls I love them."

Prosecutors also played Bundy’s 911 call for the jury.

"Help me! Help me!" a frantic Bundy can be heard telling a 911 dispatcher when she first spoke to her. "There’s a man here trying to kill a woman. She’s bleeding. He stabbed her several times."

Much of Bundy’s conversation with the 911 operator was inaudible, and she is heard frantically yelling and screaming during portions of it.

At least once, the call from her cell phone call dropped and she called 911 again. At varying times during the call she can be heard pressing three buttons on her phone.

911 Dispatcher Jessica Taylor testified that it is fairly common in certain situations for dispatchers to have difficulty getting information from distraught callers.

During Taylor’s cross examination by public defender Jim Wren II, she spent several minutes explaining notations made by the dispatcher on duty that evening to the computer aided dispatch log.

Wren had her read a portion of the log, which noted that police had dispatchers faxed information to television stations WYMT in Hazard and WKYT in Lexington.

The information was sent to the television stations with Spicer’s description in an attempt to locate him during the four-hour manhunt.

WKYT reporter Phil Pendleton testified that when a violent crime occurs, it is common for television stations to receive information about the suspects from police, who sometimes enlist the media’s help in trying to apprehend suspects.
Much of Wren’s questioning of witnesses appeared to focus on Spicer’s mental state at the time of the crime.

He had Taylor read a portion of the 911 log, which noted that police indicated Spicer was "extremely unstable and dangerous."
Wren noted Bundy’s comment about Spicer being in "trance" like state and questioned her about Spicer’s demeanor, which prompted several objections by Trimble about Wren leading the witness.

"When I went out, he was stabbing her. Then when I spoke to him, he raised up," Bundy testified in response to Wren’s questioning.

"He was like a crazy man. When you go out in your front yard and a man, who you’ve known, is stabbing a woman over and over, it makes you think of a crazy person."

Bundy noted that Spicer had always been good to her and would mow her yard, and come over to drink coffee with her. Afterwards, he would help her clean up the kitchen, take out the garbage and things of that nature.

Bundy said she had seen Spicer and Warren together with Warren’s three children, and also at times Warren and Spicer would be together with just their daughter.

Shortly before court recessed for the day Wednesday, prosecutors played an unedited jail house interview that Spicer gave to a WKYT news reporter just hours after his arrest.

Wren objected to the interview being played for the jury. Prosecutors obtained it through a grand jury subpoena.

During the interview, Spicer is asked what happened to his hand, which was bandaged, and he responded that he hurt it during the "altercation."

"I found out my wife was cheating on me and I kind of snapped," Spicer said during the interview. He later acknowledged that the two weren’t actually married, but had been seeing each other for about six years.

Spicer claimed that Warren told him she had cheated on him.

"That is when the altercation started," he said not confirming that a knife was involved. "There was just a fight. It was a pretty bad altercation."

He wasn’t sure how long the altercation lasted.

"It took them about four hours to catch me. I knew I was going to get caught," Spicer told the interviewer.

So why did he run? "I’d rather not say," he responded.

When asked what he would like to tell Warren, whose condition he didn’t know at the time, Spicer responded, "I would like to tell her I’m sorry. I love her with all my heart. Love makes people do crazy things."

Spicer also apologized to his father and family, who might be watching the interview.

"Tell everyone I’m sorry. I snapped."

After the interviewer takes the microphone off of Spicer, the camera is still rolling and he can be seen putting his head down between his hands presumably crying.

Warren is expected to be the first witness called to the stand when the trial resumes Thursday morning. It is expected to conclude as early as Thursday afternoon.

Wren reserved his opening statement until after the prosecution completes its case.