Jury convicts Wichita man of fatally beating friend in grocery store parking lot
A Wichita man charged with beating a friend and former roommate to death with his bare hands was convicted of involuntary manslaughter at the close of his jury trial earlier this month.
Steven M. Speakman is scheduled for sentencing Nov. 1 in the death of 33-year-old Haley A. Collins, who died about two weeks after he was beaten unconscious around 2 a.m. on Aug. 21, 2019, in the parking lot of the Dillons grocery store at 21st and Rock. An arrest affidavit released by the court last year says the men got into a verbal argument that turned physically violent when Collins refused to give Speakman a ride home and told him he would have to walk instead.
Dillons employees who witnessed the deadly fight reported seeing Collins push Speakman to the ground and then Speakman punch Collins on the side of his face as they were walking toward a nearby McDonald’s.
After Collins fell down, Speakman jumped on top of him and punched him multiple times, according to the affidavit.
Bruised and bloodied from the altercation, Speakman told authorities the night of the beating that he “blacked out” and attacked Collins in self-defense, the affidavit says.
Collins, a Bel Aire resident, was hospitalized and died several days later, on Sept. 5, 2019. An autopsy determined his cause of death to be blunt force injuries of the head.
Prosecutors alleged Speakman had been drinking and bickering with Collins prior to the fatal attack, and tried him for second-degree intentional murder. But jurors on Aug. 6 found him guilty of the lesser charge of reckless involuntary manslaughter, Sedgwick County District Court records show.
Speakman, 37, remains in the Sedgwick County Jail while he awaits sentencing.
