Man who ate brains of victim given 60 years in psychiatric hospital

BRIDGEPORT, Conn., Sept. 10 (UPI) -- A three-judge panel in Bridgeport, Conn., sentenced a man found to have eaten the brains and eyes of a man he killed to 60 years in a psychiatric hospital.

Tyree Lincoln Smith was found not guilty of murder by reason of insanity in July for killing a homeless man -- Angel "Tun Tun" Gonzalez -- and eating parts of his body with a bottle of sake in Lakeview Cemetery in December 2011.

Dr. Reena Kapoor, a Yale University psychiatrist, testified Smith suffered from psychotic incidents since childhood, The (Bridgeport) Connecticut Post reported Tuesday.

Superior Court Judges John Kavenewsky, John Blawie and Maria Kahn sentenced Smith to 60 years in the state's maximum-security psychiatric hospital in Middletown, the newspaper said. They could have released him.

"I am concerned there is an expectation he [Smith] would do this to other people if he was allowed to be free," prosecutor John Smriga said in his argument against Smith's release.

Police said Smith hacked up Gonzalez with a hatchet, then cannibalized his body, which was found 39 days later in the abandoned apartment where Smith grew up. Smith said he ate Gonzalez's eyes because he "needed eyes to see in the spirit realm."

"I'm really sorry for what I did, that I couldn't be myself," Smith told the panel of judges at his sentencing. "It really had nothing to do with the other person."