Man sentenced to 10-20 years in prison for stabbings at Target in East Liberty

A homeless man who took a teenager hostage using a knife and injured her and two others at the Target in East Liberty will serve 10 to 20 years in prison, an Allegheny County judge ordered Thursday.

A jury in June found Leon Walls, 44, guilty but mentally ill on nine counts; not guilty by reason of insanity on two counts; and not guilty on seven other counts in connection with the stabbings on March 25, 2013.

Police said Walls stabbed a man along Highland Avenue outside the Target, ran inside the big-box retailer and took Allison Meadows, of Chattanooga, Tenn., hostage for a few moments before he stabbed her and cut his initial victim and another man when they intervened.

Common Pleas Judge Donna Jo McDaniel indicated she'd prefer to send Walls to a mental hospital and was critical that sentencing laws required her to send him to a state prison system that historically has failed to adequately handle mentally ill inmates.

Walls' lawyer, public defender Andrew Capone, called the sentence “cruel and unusual” and a “fundamental failure” that few resources exist within the state prison system for someone in Walls' condition. The state has shuttered 10 state hospitals since 1980.

Walls, who had moved to Pittsburgh less than a month before the stabbing, was diagnosed with schizophrenia following his arrest. Medical records and records from previous arrests in other states showed he had a history of mental illness.

Meadows and her family sued Target in September 2013, claiming the store had inadequate security and failed to provide them with a safe place to shop. Target claimed in a filing the two men who tried to help the girl were at least partially responsible for the violence inside its store.

Adam Brandolph is a staff writer for Trib Total Media. Reach him at 412-391-0927 or abrandolph@tribweb.com.