Cedar Rapids man pleads guilty to attempted murder of wife

CEDAR RAPIDS — A Cedar Rapids man pleaded guilty Friday to the attempted murder of his wife, more than four years after he stabbed her with a kitchen knife.

In exchange for the plea from Anthony Depolis, 34, prosecutors agreed to drop two other charges — willful injury causing serious injury, a Class C felony, and first-offense domestic abuse assault with a weapon, an aggravated misdemeanor.

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Depolis faces up to 25 years in prison for the Class B felony at his Nov. 28 sentencing hearing. Under Iowa law, he must serve 70 percent of his sentence before being eligible for parole — 17.5 years, if he is sentenced to the maximum term.

At the Friday plea hearing, Depolis requested an immediate sentencing, which the state resisted.

“Generally, I wouldn’t resist that,” First Assistant Linn County Attorney Monica Slaughter said. “But with registered victims who want to be present at sentencing and give oral statements, statutorily I can’t agree to move up the sentencing date.”

Sixth Judicial District Judge Valerie Clay agreed, given the circumstances.

Depolis replied, “There are no registered victims in this case. There’s only one victim, and she’s deceased.”

Depolis’ wife, Diana L. Depolis, died in 2021, a year after he had been arrested for her attempted murder.

What happened

The attempted murder charge was filed after Diana Depolis, 37 at the time, was stabbed multiple times July 6, 2020, at Creekside Apartments, 3009 12th Ave. SW.

“I used a kitchen knife to stab my wife in the throat area, directly, about two times,” the defendant told the court. “I was out of body during this experience, so my memory is a bit fragmented, but that is what I remember taking place.”

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Anthony Depolis previously asked the court to keep his statements to police out of his trial, saying he didn’t have the mental capacity to waive his rights at the time. In February, a judge ruled the statements would be admissible as evidence.

Depolis told police he had bought a knife and planned to kill his wife, according to court documents. A criminal complaint noted a serious stab wound to the victim’s neck, as well as defensive injuries to her arms and hands.

He was at the apartment when police arrived, where they found his hands and clothing covered in blood.

A psychologist testified in January that the defendant, who has a history of mental illness on the schizophrenia spectrum, hadn’t taken prescribed medication in the days leading up the incident. He also was a daily marijuana user.

A forensic evaluator said Depolis had no memory of being interrogated by police, saying he felt detached from his body and under water during questioning.

Sixth Judicial District Judge Ian Thornhill ruled the evaluator’s opinion didn’t “negate” the circumstances around the waiver of rights and the interview, during which Depolis spoke clearly and responded logically to questions.

In 2022, Depolis was found competent to stand trial after being suspected of faking a mental condition to avoid it. The attempts to evaluate and restore his competency delayed proceedings for more than a year.

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Dr. Arnold Andersen, a psychiatrist with the Iowa Medical and Classification Center in Coralville, said he couldn’t determine with a degree of medical certainty that Depolis was competent, but testified that his competency was “more probable than not.”

During the evaluation, Anderson said Depolis declined to answer the majority of questions. Another psychiatrist at the Coralville prison said Depolis didn’t trust the psychiatrists, calling them “state” doctors who couldn’t be impartial.

An attorney for Depolis said the defendant wasn’t malingering — faking mental illness — but rather was declining questions that would hurt his legal defense.

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