Man, 55, arrested in fatal stabbing

Police have arrested a 55-year-old man in connection with the Sunday stabbing death of Leonard Hecox.

The suspect was booked into the Sedgwick County Jail at about 7 p.m. Monday following interviews that shed light on the circumstances leading to Wichita's fifth homicide of the year, Lt. Todd Ojile said Tuesday.

Neighbors thought Hecox, 44, was passed out from drinking when they saw him on the front lawn of his house in the 2500 block of South Bennett, near Pawnee and Meridian.

But when he hadn't moved for hours, someone called 911 at 11:54 a.m. He was pronounced dead at noon.

Investigators questioned more than two dozen people Sunday and Monday, Ojile said, and eventually pieced together this chain of events:

Two men — one of whom had a long-standing dispute with Hecox — broke into his house sometime after 2 a.m. Sunday. Startled, Hecox fled from the house.

The two men left and Hecox returned to his house, where he got into an argument with his longtime girlfriend, who lives with him.

The girlfriend then called a friend of hers, who came over to provide support. The argument continued for a few more hours, at which point the girlfriend called an acquaintance and asked him to come get her and her friend so they could leave.

When the acquaintance arrived, the dispute in the front yard escalated. The suspect is accused of stabbing Hecox once in the upper right chest.

The suspect has been booked on suspicion of second-degree murder. Investigators plan to present evidence in the case to the Sedgwick County District Attorney's Office later this week, Ojile said.

The two men who broke into the house are not connected to the homicide, Ojile said, but each has been arrested for other reasons: one in connection with the burglary and the other for an outstanding warrant.

This story was originally published March 23, 2011 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Man, 55, arrested in fatal stabbing."