HAMILTON — Scott Sizemore, accused of trying to stab his girlfriend to death in a store parking lot, begged the woman not to testify Friday in an emotional court hearing.

        “I'm sorry; I love you,” Mr. Sizemore, 25, told Bethany Durbin, looking toward her in Hamilton Municipal Court with a pained expression.

        Judge John G. Rosmarin sent Mr. Sizemore's case to a Butler County grand jury following the hearing that included Ms. Durbin's tearful testimony. She described being stabbed multiple times outside the Kroger store on North Erie Highway. Ms. Durbin said the attack occurred after she told Mr. Sizemore on Jan. 6 that she wanted to break up with him. Two bystanders intervened and saved Ms. Durbin's life, police have said.

Sizemore

        During the proceedings, Mr. Sizemore stared at Ms. Durbin and kept trying to talk to her. Judge Rosmarin repeatedly warned Mr. Sizemore to be quiet.

        Commenting after the hearing, Mr. Sizemore's court-appointed lawyer, Brad Carmella, said his client's mental state would be a factor in the case.

        “I think there are some mental health issues that need to be addressed,” he said.

        Mr. Carmella said his client had lost his job and been evicted recently — and then had the added devastation of Ms. Durbin breaking up with him.

        Mr. Sizemore apparently “felt rejected again” when Ms. Durbin testified against him Friday, Mr. Carmella said.

        Ms. Durbin testified that she and Mr. Sizemore have a child. They had lived together from December 1999 until October, she said, but they continued to see each other almost daily.

        As the couple went on errands Jan. 6, Mr. Sizemore told Ms. Durbin he had become a Christian and was trying to change his life. But she accused him of constantly lying to her and said she wanted to stop seeing him.

        Her insistence that they break up “was making the devil come out” from him again, Ms. Durbin said.

        While they sat in her car at Kroger's, “he said things to me like he would kill me before he would let me go,” she said.

        The couple got out of the car and she was slammed to the ground and stabbed.

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