
By: Patti Weaver
(Stillwater, Okla.) — A Stillwater man avoided a jury trial this week by admitting that he had attacked his 69-year-old father, for which he was given a seven-year prison term as part of a plea bargain with the prosecution approved in court last week.
District Judge Phillip Corley noted that the defendant, Kenneth Eugene Powers, 47, had mental issues in the past, but ruled that he was competent to enter guilty pleas to aggravated assault and battery after two prior felony convictions and resisting arrest, for which he was given a concurrent one-year jail term.
The attack on Sept. 17, 2018, was reported on Oct. 25, 2018, by the victim, who could not stand without support and had approximately 40 staples to close an incision made from the top of his head above the left eye to the crown of his head downward to his ear, Payne County Sheriff’s Deputy Tomm Edwards wrote in an affidavit.
The victim told the deputy “he went to the Stillwater emergency room on Oct. 17, 2018, due to having weakness in his right leg and headaches,” as well as having trouble speaking and remembering things, the affidavit said. After the victim had a CT scan that revealed bilateral subdural hematomas, he was transported to OU Medical Center for surgery due to life-threatening conditions, the affidavit said.
The victim said “his doctors advised him the subdural hematomas were caused when his son, Kenneth Eugene Powers, assaulted him on Sept. 17, 2018,” the affidavit said.
At the time of the attack, the then 46-year-old son was in robust health at 6 feet tall and 181 pounds, while his father, then 69, had COPD, arthritis and hypertension, the affidavit said.
Due to the defendant’s two felony shoplifting convictions in Payne County in 2015, for which he had received five years’ probation except 90 days in jail, Powers could have been given a prison term of three years to life, if convicted by a jury of aggravated assault and battery against his father.
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