Norfolk man convicted of murder in 2019 Ocean View stabbing death
NORFOLK — Jurors convicted a Norfolk man of murder on Monday and recommended he spend 17 years in prison for the crime — stabbing someone to death in his apartment.
Matthew Charles Bass, 44, stood trial for three days before jurors convicted him of the only charge against him, second-degree murder, for stabbing 50-year-old Darrell Wayne Long in an Ocean View apartment.
Circuit Judge Mary Jane Hall will formally sentence Bass at a later court hearing, but judges almost always follow juries' sentencing recommendations.
Around 10:30 p.m. on Aug. 27, 2019, dispatchers got a call about a stabbing victim in the 200 block of West Ocean View Avenue, Norfolk police said at the time. When officers got there, they found Long with multiple stab wounds. Paramedics took him to Bon Secours DePaul hospital, where he died.
Detectives learned that Bass lived in an apartment in the same complex and went inside to look for him. He wasn't there, but a detective found a sheathed knife in the closet with what looked like blood on the hilt, Detective Kyle
Austin said in a sworn affidavit.
A day after the stabbing, Dennis Berry, 67, told The Virginian-Pilot he was in the room when Bass attacked, fought with and stabbed Long.
Bass started arguing with Long, calling him all sorts of names, Berry said. Then he hit Long, who fell down on the corner of a couch. He responded by asking Bass something to the effect of, “What are you doing? I don't even know you.”
Then the two went at it — punching each other, falling to the ground, hitting each other some more, Berry said. One of Long's friends, who'd been hanging out, got in the middle to try to break things up. Then everything ended as quickly as it started, with Bass getting up and bolting out the door.
“I never saw him with a knife,” Berry said. “It happened so fast.”
And Long apparently didn't realize he'd been stabbed until after the fight.
“Oh (expletive), I been cut,” Long said, according to Berry.
“I looked over at him and I could see blood running down his shirt — right there,” Berry said, pointing near the center of his chest.
Long's friend — the one who tried to break up the fight — got his phone, called 911, and applied pressure to the wound, imploring him not to go to sleep. Meanwhile, Long just kept repeating, “I don't believe this.”