Mental evaluation ordered for Rogers man accused of stabbing coworker with ‘X-Acto knife’

ROGERS, Ark. (KNWA/KFTA) — A Rogers man accused of stabbing his coworker at a convenience store in June has pleaded not guilty and been ordered to undergo a mental evaluation, according to Benton County prosecutor Joshua Robinson.

Samuel Pletcher, 33, was arrested on June 6 on an attempted capital murder charge.

On July 16, a Benton County judge ordered Pletcher to undergo a mental evaluation. In the order, it says “There is reasonable suspicion to believe that the defendant is not fit to proceed.”

The order also says all further proceedings in the case are suspended pending the outcome of the evaluation.

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Rogers police responded to the Kum & Go on West Pleasant Grove Road around 12:30 p.m. on June 6 for a stabbing call.

A man, identified as Pletcher, called Rogers Central Dispatch saying he had just stabbed a coworker in the head and face multiple times, according to an affidavit.

An officer found a woman in a cooler in the back of the store holding paper towels over the side of her face and sitting in a pool of blood with a blood-soaked shirt.

She said she was cut in the face and believed her jaw was broken, according to the affidavit.

Pletcher allegedly had a laceration on his right hand below his ring finger and pinky that was bleeding. Medics treated him on the scene before being taken to the Rogers Police Department.

He was interviewed at the station and said he wished to have an attorney present before admitting “he had ‘stabbed her’ … beyond that, he wished to ‘plead the fifth’,” according to the affidavit.

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Detectives searched the scene and found an “X-Acto knife” near the pool of blood, the document said.

Video surveillance footage from inside the convenience store showed the woman being followed by Pletcher into a walk-in cooler holding a knife before running out seconds later.

Detectives spoke with the woman on June 7 in a phone call after learning she had been released from the hospital. She said she and the manager had reprimanded Pletcher for poor work performance a day before the attack.

Pletcher is being held in the Benton County Detention Center on a $1 million bond and has been ordered to have no contact with the woman.

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