A 51-year-old man charged with the second-degree murder of Robert Knott in Alexandria’s West End pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity yesterday (Monday).
Ricky Dehate was charged with second-degree murder when Knott, 54, died from his injuries on Sept. 13, 2023, two days after he was kicked and punched unconscious at a bus stop in the 2500 block of N. Van Dorn Street. Dehate’s attorney, Mike Hadeed, doesn’t deny that his client committed the act, but said he did it while having a psychotic episode.
The case is being prosecuted by Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorneys David Lord and Meghan Prieto.
“Mr. Dehate brutally and violently attacked Mr. Knott, causing significant injuries to his brain, ultimately leading to his death,” Prieto said.
The prosecution admitted video of the assault taken from an apartment complex security camera across the street. The video showed Dehate and Knott, both experiencing homelessness at the time, sitting on a bench at the bus stop. Dehate then stood up and punched Knott repeatedly until he collapsed on the ground.
Dehate walked away from the scene with a shopping basket and returned three times to kick Knott on the ground.
The jury was also shown body camera footage from an Alexandria police officer at the scene. In the videos, Dehate said that he had blood on his hands and boots because he cut himself shaving and manicuring his nails. He also told police that he briefly spoke with Knott at the bus stop, but left soon after seeing that he was injured.
“The man approached me in dark,” Dehate said. “There’s no light in that place at all, period. So, I don’t know what this motherf—–r looks like. Okay? Well, then he sat there, and when we went to the bus stop, when I seen him, I was like, holy f——g s–t, bro. And he sat there, and he fell down to the ground. I was like, ‘Well, you know what? Look at me real quick,’ and when I looked, I was like, Holy f–k. I left. You understand? I said, ‘Look, I gotta go,’ and I left.”
Dehate continued, “You understand I have nothing to do with that guy, whatever happened to him. I can’t explain what happened to him. All I know is that he was f—–d up. You understand what I say? I never took nothing from him. There’s no money in my wallet.”
Hadeed said that he took the case because the public defender’s office was unavailable.
In opening statements, he told the jury that Dehate was under the misapprehension that Knott had stolen money from him. He said Dehate was experiencing “confabulation,” filling in lapses by creating false memories, and that his acts were not malicious, but “the tragic result of a mind overcome by illness.”
“This case is about a man whose mind failed him at the worst possible moment,” Hadeed said. “It’s about a man who suffered from a severe mental disorder — one that distorted his perception of reality, one that created false but deeply felt beliefs, and one that, in the moment, took away his ability to govern his actions by the power of reason.”
Dehate, who is being held in the Alexandria jail, expressed no emotion as the video of the assault was published and shown to the jury. Prior to his imprisonment in the city jail, he was admitted under court order to Virginia’s central state psychiatric hospital in Petersburg, where he was prescribed antipsychotic medication, Hadeed said.
“Unfortunately and tragically, he was not medicated at the time of this offense,” Hadeed said. “He believed he was being victimized. He believed money had been taken from him. He believed that the man in front of him had wronged him. He believed that the much larger man was a former Army ranger, a threat in him, requiring him to attack first, to have a chance. These beliefs were false, but to him, they were real.”
Dehate is a registered sex offender in the state of Virginia and was listed on the registry for committing sexual offenses against children in 2002.
The case is being heard by Alexandria Circuit Court Judge Rebecca Wade. The three-day jury trial is expected to wrap with a verdict on Wednesday.
