Man Gets 9 Years in Knife Attack

A mental patient was sentenced to nine years in prison Thursday for the April stabbing of a social worker at a psychiatric rehabilitation center in Santa Monica.

Larry Anthony Taylor, 27, pleaded guilty to second-degree attempted murder in the attack on Shirley Ann Sauerwein at a board-and-care facility.

Taylor, who could have been given life if convicted of first-degree attempted murder, entered the reduced plea with the understanding that Superior Court Judge Robert Altman would give him the sentence he received, said Deputy Dist. Atty. Hank Goldberg.

“We think it’s a fair sentence,” Goldberg said. “The evidence at trial probably would have shown he was not capable of forming the premeditation required for first-degree attempted murder.”

Goldberg said Sauerwein, employed by the county Department of Children’s Services, agreed.

Taylor was apparently upset over an impending court appearance when he attacked Sauerwein, 44, stabbing her five times in the chest and arms before she managed to fend him off. The stabbing came less than two months after social worker Robbyn Panitch was stabbed to death at a Santa Monica mental health clinic.