photo by: Nick Gerik

Lawrence police officers respond to a reported stabbing in the 1100 block of Tennessee Street, Saturday, Aug. 17, 2019.

A Lawrence woman has been sentenced to probation after pleading no contest in connection with a domestic stabbing, but the victim reportedly tried to blame the attack on “two black males,” court documents say.

Stephanie K. Bryant Henderson, 34, was arrested Aug. 17 and later charged with aggravated battery for allegedly stabbing a woman with whom she’d had an on-and-off dating relationship, according to court documents. The stabbing occurred in the 1100 block of Tennessee Street.

The Journal-World requested the police affidavit supporting Bryant Henderson’s arrest and received it after she was sentenced this week. Allegations in affidavits have not been proved in court, but this information contributed to Bryant Henderson’s conviction in the case.

According to the affidavit:

An officer arrived at the 1100 block of Tennessee Street just after 8 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 17. There he found a topless woman with a stab wound to her right forearm leaning over Bryant Henderson, whom he recognized from previous law enforcement contact.

Online Douglas County District Court records show multiple cases in which the victim was charged with violent offenses against Bryant Henderson.

photo by: Douglas County Sheriff’s Office

Stephanie Kay Bryant Henderson, pictured in August 2019

The victim reportedly said her wound was squirting blood, and as the officer prepared the tourniquet, he heard Bryant Henderson say “I stabbed her,” the affidavit says. Bryant Henderson told the officer the knife was in the grass nearby, and he found the serrated steak knife.

Bryant Henderson was reportedly uncooperative as police placed her into handcuffs, asking why she was being arrested. An officer told her, “You said you stabbed her!” according to the affidavit.

Other officers spoke with a female witness who had been riding in a car headed southbound on Tennessee Street when Bryant Henderson and the victim reportedly entered the roadway. The male driver pulled over to help, and he gave the victim an emergency blanket from his car, the affidavit says.

The female witness told police she overheard Bryant Henderson say the two had been fighting and she had stabbed the victim. The witness said she heard the victim tell Bryant Henderson to tell police they were “attacked by two black males,” but that Bryant Henderson told the victim not to lie, the affidavit says.

The victim, a 35-year-old woman, was taken to Lawrence Memorial Hospital. She had an entry wound and an exit wound on her arm. When interviewed by an officer, the victim was reportedly uncooperative and said that she was stabbed “by a (expletive) in an alley,” using a racial slur.

Bryant Henderson did not make any further statements to police and asked for an attorney, the affidavit says.

In an email response to follow-up questions from the Journal-World, Cheryl Wright Kunard, assistant to the Douglas County district attorney, said she did not have the information she would need to answer whether the DA’s office had considered filing charges against the victim. The prosecutor for that case was out of the office Friday afternoon, Wright Kunard said.

According to the charging document in her case, Bryant Henderson was initially charged with aggravated battery as a level-4 felony, with level 1 being most severe. On Sept. 17, she pleaded no contest to the same charge but as a level-7 felony, which mandates a lesser sentence.

Bryant Henderson’s appointed defense attorney, Hatem Chahine, told the Journal-World he thought the plea agreement was appropriate. He said he and his client were happy with the outcome and the grant of probation, and that Bryant Henderson knows she’ll need to complete treatment during her probation.

A judge this week sentenced Bryant Henderson to 24 months of probation with an underlying sentence of 27 months in prison followed by 12 months of post-release supervision should her probation be revoked. She must complete evaluations for domestic violence, drugs and alcohol and mental health, and she is to have no contact with the victim, according to information from Wright Kunard.