Newspaper

One of the suspects awaiting trial for the killing of a Burrton man had been released from prison just weeks before the slaying and was wanted by authorities for violating his parole.

Robert Engelhardt, 27, was wanted by authorities well before police say he was involved in the June 13 fatal stabbing of 24-year-old Michael J. Smith.

A warrant for Engelhardt's arrest had been issued by the Kansas Department of Corrections April 25. Engelhardt, on parole for a 1992 aggravated sodomy conviction, had failed to report to his parole officer less than a week after his release from prison.

Authorities say he had disappeared.

"We didn't know where he was," Kansas Department of Corrections spokesman Bill Meskill said.

It wasn't the first time Engelhardt had disappeared. He was returned to prison in July 2000 after failing then to report to his parole officer and for not disclosing a recent DUI arrest.

Meskill said efforts were made to track down Engelhardt after his most recent failure to report to a Sedgwick County parole officer. Engelhardt's last known address was in Wichita.

"In cases where someone fails to report, we make checks with family, friends and neighbors" in an effort to locate a suspect, Meskill said.

Engelhardt's name had also been entered into the National Crime Information Center, a database checked by police and dispatchers during traffic stops.

But Engelhardt remained elusive. He was finally discovered hiding out in the attic of a Wichita home June 20. By then, police say, he was a murder suspect.

Engelhardt, along with alleged accomplice Brian Smith, is charged with first-degree murder in connection with the slaying of Michael Smith. Michael Smith and 27-year-old Brian Smith are not related.

Engelhardt and Smith remain in custody awaiting a preliminary hearing set for 9 a.m. Friday on the charges. Each face 25 years to life in prison if convicted.

Police say the pair brutally killed Michael Smith, stabbing him multiple times. Prosecutors have failed to find a motive in the killing and think Michael Smith was a stranger to the men at the time of his slaying.

Smith was killed in the early morning hours of June 13. He'd reportedly been awakened by the suspects who paid a visit to the trailer house at 901 E. 11th Lot 1 where Smith had been staying with friends. A confrontation of some sort ensued and police say Smith was attacked and killed. His body was discovered in a Harvey County ditch June 18, five days after his car was found abandoned and bloody in a ditch less than a mile away.

Through interviews with Smith's family and friends, investigators identified Engelhardt and Brian Smith as suspects. Still, the pair remained elusive.

Engelhardt was captured June 20 in Wichita, while Smith remained on the run until turning himself into Newton police June 23.

Harvey County Attorney Matt Treaster said it was unfortunate that Engelhardt had remained at large though a warrant had been issued for his arrest prior to the slayings. But he stopped short of laying blame on state correction officials who'd reportedly lost track of their parolee.

"He was able to go unsupervised, but there was no clerical error" on the part of the Department of Corrections, Treaster said. "(Engelhardt) just walked away."

"I don't think there is anything anybody could have done differently to prevent this tragedy," he said.

Brian Smith was not on parole at the time of the killings. He successfully completed probation in August 2000 on a 1994 Sedgwick County conviction of burglary and forgery.

Smith had a prior conviction in Sedgwick County for aggravated battery. He was sentenced in 1993 to three to 10 years in prison in that case and in 1995 violated his probation and was imprisoned. He was released Aug. 25, 1999.