An Aberdeen man who pleaded guilty to murdering his mother in their South Aberdeen home a few days before Thanksgiving 2018 has filed a motion to withdraw that plea.

In the motion filed Oct. 18 in Grays Harbor Superior Court, Edgar Concepcion Lugo stated he “reaffirms his plea of not guilty by reason of insanity” and claimed he had been coerced by his attorney to enter the plea when he was not mentally capable of doing so.

Lugo was arrested Nov. 19, 2018, outside the house he shared with his parents at 223 E. King St. His mother, Asuncion Lugo, was found inside dead from horrific knife wounds, stabbed more than 20 times.

Lugo claimed his attorney had “placed him under undue duress by coercing him into accepting the plea agreement while under a medicated state of mind, due to the side effects and influence of the two prescribed anti-psychotic medications … making him easily susceptible to suggestion.”

The handwritten motion to withdraw said Lugo “does not fully understand the charges against him, has no conscious knowledge or memory committing any crime nor has any knowledge or memory to arrange or plot in advance to commit any crime and asserts his right to a trial by jury to defend against the charge.”

On Oct. 31, attorney David S. Hatch was appointed to represent Lugo on the motion to withdraw the plea agreement.

While in the county jail the past year on $500,000 bond, Lugo underwent several competency hearings to judge his mental state before signing the plea agreement dated Sept. 30. In that agreement, signed by Lugo, his attorney David Arcuri, Chief Criminal Deputy Prosecutor Jason Walker, and Superior Court Judge David Mistachkin, the sentence recommendation of just over 30 years was agreed upon, followed by 3 years of community custody, on a single charge of murder in the first degree — domestic violence. The maximum penalty for the offense is life in prison.

Lugo remains in the Grays Harbor County Jail and has not officially been sentenced, pending review of his motion to withdraw.

In these cases — which happen but aren’t all that common, according to County Prosecutor Katie Svoboda — the new lawyer will review the circumstances of Lugo’s plea and provide a briefing to the court. Svoboda’s office will then have an opportunity to respond, and a hearing will be held that may or may not include testimony, depending on the issues raised by the defense. It’s the judge that ultimately decides if there is a basis to allow withdrawal of a guilty plea, said Svoboda.

On the day of the murder, officers were called to the East King Street residence after Asuncion Lugo, 77, placed a 911 call as the attack was taking place. Aberdeen Police Chief Steve Shumate said the 911 dispatcher could hear a male screaming in the background, sounds consistent with an assault and although her accent made it somewhat hard to understand, investigators believe Mrs. Lugo was saying, “he’s killing me.”

Officers from Aberdeen, Hoquiam, Cosmoplis and the Grays Harbor County Sheriff’s Office arrived within a few minutes. According to court documents, several officers, believing the assault was still in progress, “entered the attached garage with the intention of forcibly entering the house. The suspect burst out of the door with a baseball bat.” According to Shumate, the man refused to drop the bat, and one officer discharged his service weapon, missing. The suspect was subdued by non-lethal means and taken into custody.

Inside the home, Asuncion Lugo was found dead from “obvious trauma caused by a knife,” said Shumate. Court documents report she had been stabbed with a kitchen knife with a 7-inch blade “at least 20 times in the body, face, and head.”

The police had been to the home before, said Shumate. Lugo had been arrested in January 2018 for violating a no-contact order involving his mother and, according to court documents, Lugo had entered his parents’ bedroom and threatened to kill his mother in a 2013 incident. There was no protection order in place and Lugo was living with his parents at the time of the murder.

At his first court appearance the day after the murder, Lugo wept openly as he was walked in. Walker told District Court Judge Thomas Copland that Lugo had a history of conflicts with his mother, and that Lugo had trouble controlling his mental state, particularly when he was under the influence of drugs. Walker said a quantity of drugs were found in Lugo’s room, along with an unlawfully possessed firearm.