A change of plea hearing for Kenneth Wentworth Jr., 27, Hope was continued Monday to allow additional time for him to undergo a mental evaluation.
Bartholomew Superior Court 1 Judge James Worton set Wentworth’s next change of plea hearing for Oct. 22.
Wentworth was arrested on charges of robbery, leaving the scene of a crash involving injury, auto theft and battery after a carjacking incident in the Columbus Regional Hospital parking lot on Jan. 1, court documents state.
Columbus police officers were sent to the hospital parking lot at 2400 17th St. about a vehicle crash. When they arrived, they found that Wentworth had fled on foot after crashing the vehicle.
When officers arrived, Wentworth and a family member of the carjacking victim were in a physical struggle on 17th Street just off the hospital grounds, police said.
Police determined that Wentworth entered the unoccupied driver’s seat of a 2016 Chrysler Town and Country minivan and attempted to drive away, police said.
The vehicle’s owner, Lorrie A. Crouch, 56, of Hope, partially entered the passenger side of her vehicle and struggled with Wentworth, police said. Wentworth is accused of putting the vehicle in reverse with the passenger door striking Crouch’s 88-year-old mother, Sara Smith, who was seated near the vehicle in a wheelchair, police said.
Wentworth then is accused of accelerating the vehicle forward and striking a parked car, causing Crouch to fall out of the minivan and strike her head on the concrete parking lot, police said. Both women were hospitalized for their injuries following the incident.
Wentworth has been held in the Bartholomew County Jail since his arrest, jail records show. His bond was reduced to $500,000 in February, court records state. He is being represented by Bartholomew County public defender Aaron Edwards.
