Man held for trial in fatal stabbing
A Southwest Greensburg man who was held for trial Thursday in the stabbing death of his former girlfriend outside a Greensburg tavern last month had her photograph -- with eyes blacked out and the words "Die Mother-----" on it -- inside his truck the day before she died.
The marred picture of murder victim Candace Cohen, 20, of Hempfield Township, was taped to the dashboard of the truck owned by her accused killer, Jeffrey C. West Jr., 26, of 407 Chestnut St., according to Robert W. Preston, an auto repairman who testified yesterday at West's preliminary hearing.
Preston said he saw the photo when he worked on West's truck at the Pep Boys Automotive Supercenter on the afternoon of Feb. 23, about 12 hours before Cohen was stabbed to death in an alley outside the rear of Mr. Toad's tavern on East Otterman Street.
Preston did not know the identity of the woman in the photograph, but Kris Demorest, the victim's stepfather, testified it was her high school graduation portrait.
After more than three hours of testimony from six people, District Justice James Albert, of Greensburg, ordered West to stand trial on charges of criminal homicide and first-degree murder in the Feb. 24 death of Cohen, and attempted homicide and aggravated assault in the stabbing of Chad Baker, 28, of Jasper Drive, Irwin. Baker, who was Cohen's boyfriend at the time of her death, was stabbed on South Main Street when he pursued the suspect.
West is accused of fatally stabbing Cohen at about 1:10 a.m. Feb. 24, after initially confronting her inside Mr. Toad's, said Thomas R. Boscia, 28, of Irwin, who was with his friends Baker and Cohen. West had talked with Cohen on her cellular phone at about 12:30 a.m. and appeared "very upset" went he came to the tavern to talk with Cohen, Boscia said. West took Cohen by the arm and escorted her outside the bar and into the alley, Boscia said.
Boscia said about a minute elapsed when he went outside to see West "uppercutting (punching) her pretty fast," at least four times. Boscia said West ran when he screamed. When Boscia lifted up the fallen Cohen, he felt the warmth of her blood in his hands. He tried to stop the bleeding by applying pressure on her wounds, but "there was just so much more blood."
Cohen died at 2:20 p.m. Feb. 24 at UPMC Presbyterian hospital in Pittsburgh. Cohen had been stabbed three times in the back and four times in the chest, Westmoreland County Detective Hugh Shearer testified from an autopsy report.
As Cohen lay mortally bleeding in the alley, Baker ran after the suspect, Boscia said. An acquaintance of Boscia's, Christopher S. Visco, 27, of Irwin, said he ran out of the tavern to follow Baker, who confronted the suspect on the west side of South Main Street.
Visco said he saw a man in a red, hooded sweatshirt punch Baker twice in the head, then stab him three or four times in the torso with a "huge knife." Baker stumbled across South Main Street, where Visco said he took off his shirt and applied pressure to stanch the flow of blood.
"He was bleeding profusely. He kept saying, 'Jeff West did this. Jeff West did this,'" Visco said.
State police Trooper Gregory Metz testified that West was wearing a red, hooded sweatshirt and his clothes were bloody when he arrested the suspect in the 500 block of Westminster Avenue.
"There was so much blood, you had to be blind not to see it," Metz said.
Police say the murder weapon, found in an alley behind the former Troutman's department store on South Main Street, was a knife with an 8-inch blade.
Defense attorney Jerome Tierney sought to have the first-degree murder charge dismissed, arguing that there was "no clear-cut showing of the intent to kill when he went into the bar." Tierney said the incident was more likely involuntary manslaughter instead of first-degree murder.
"Something snapped in Jeffrey West," Tierney said, adding that West suffered from depression and was a heroin addict.
Assistant District Attorney Patrick Noonan argued, however, that West intended to kill Cohen as he held her by the neck and stabbed her limp body. Noonan pointed out there was no testimony that West had used heroin that evening.
"This defendant cut this woman down in cold blood," Noonan said.
After the hearing, Noonan said he would confer with Westmoreland County District Attorney John Peck to decide whether to seek the death penalty against West. The prosecution does not have to make that decision until West's arraignment, which is scheduled for April 30 before Judge Richard E. McCormick Jr., Noonan said.
"We don't want to announce prematurely that discretionary decision," Noonan said.
