Bellefonte man heading to state prison for unprovoked stabbing that nearly killed a man
A Bellefonte man was sentenced Tuesday to more than four years in state prison for stabbing a random, unarmed man in an attack that prosecutors said was nearly fatal.
James R. Surovec, 30, was sentenced by Centre County Judge Julia Rater to 4 1/2 to 20 years in state prison. He received credit for about 14 months served.
Surovec twice stabbed the man in the neck with a foot-long knife in July 2023 inside an apartment building along West High Street. The knife came within inches of ending the man’s life, Centre County First Assistant District Attorney Joshua Andrews said.
The man collapsed on the public street in downtown Bellefonte and was found in a pool of blood by a neighbor and then his girlfriend and child, Andrews wrote in a memo sent to Rater.
The attack, Andrews wrote, will be “profoundly felt by the many who were directly and indirectly involved. That included a building full of tenants who had a stranger come into their building and the man’s family who found him bloodied.
“When he was found by his neighbor, girlfriend, and child, the trauma of that attack unfortunately became shared by everyone involved,” Andrews wrote. “Random acts of violence shake a community regardless of the circumstances, but for a child to walk past the remnants of a fire in their home to find their parent bleeding on the street causes damage unlikely to be undone.”
Surovec was captured on surveillance footage going to and leaving the scene. When he was found, police said he was in possession of a knife that had the man’s blood on it.
He pleaded no contest to one felony count of aggravated assault. Attempted homicide, recklessly endangering another person and arson charges were dropped. The plea meant he accepted the conviction, but did not admit guilt.
Shortly after he was arrested, borough and Spring Township police officers who knew Surovec well told prosecutors he appears to suffer from a mental illness.
In one letter sent to Bellefonte police, Surovec claimed he was being subjected to “illegal technologies” that could pick up his thoughts and force speech.
This story was originally published September 10, 2024 at 11:16 AM.