Stabbing nets man 23 years

By Tony Gonzalez

Published: October 1, 2008

A judge sentenced a Waynesboro man to 23 years in prison for stabbing his ex-girlfriend and a computer repairman.

Vincent McKinley Brown, 39, hid in a stairwell armed with a knife and gun outside the woman’s apartment on the 400 block of Florence Avenue, then ambushed the 40-year-old Stuarts Draft repairman in a jealous rage, stabbing him in the chest and arm before forcing his way inside, where he stabbed his ex-girlfriend in the chest.

“He said, ‘I’m going to kill you, you [expletive] ...,’ ” the 47-year-old woman testified in September 2007, shortly after the Aug. 18 attack. “I begged him not to stab me.”

Authorities declined to identify the victims.

Waynesboro Circuit Court Judge Humes J. Franklin Jr. sentenced Brown on two felony counts of malicious wounding, one felony count of breaking and entering with intent to commit assault with a deadly weapon and one felony count of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. Brown pleaded guilty April 15.

The repairman was treated for serious injuries at the University of Virginia Medical Center and released two days later. Brown’s ex-girlfriend was treated for less serious injuries at Augusta Medical Center.

After the victims escaped, a three-hour standoff with police ensued while Brown remained holed up in the apartment with another woman. More than a dozen Waynesboro police officers and Augusta County sheriff’s deputies, including SWAT teams from both departments, were called.

The other woman was rescued without resistance from Brown. The standoff concluded after midnight at which time police took a firearm and 4-inch-long folding knife from the intoxicated Brown, authorities said.

Brown is being held at the Middle River Regional Jail in Verona.