A previous problem at a South Toledo group home for men prompted police to check the facility when a man who turned out to live there was found dead on nearby railroad tracks, investigators said Monday as the trial for an alleged killer began.

Patrol Officer Mel Russell and Detective Sgt. Roy Kennedy testified before Lucas County Common Pleas Judge Myron Duhart they were both struck by how little blood they saw around Roy Roberts’ body after it was run over by a train near Gibbons Street and Airline Avenue the night of May 2, 2014. That made them think the 51-year-old died somewhere else, and his body was dumped on the tracks later.

According to testimony, Mr. Roberts’ place of death turned out to be a few blocks away at 129 Dale St., where he lived with Lecorius Reynolds.

Police fanned out in the surrounding neighborhood to check for missing people after responding to the railroad’s report of its train having struck Mr. Roberts’ naked, and thus initially unidentified, body.

Officer Russell said one of the first places officers went was the group home because there had been a recent weapons call there involving two men engaged in a sword fight, one with a real sword, the other with a tire iron. The officer said his initial intent was to ensure everyone who lived there was accounted for, but he saw congealed blood on the living-room carpet.

More blood was on a stairway to the second floor, then lots of it around the bed in Mr. Roberts’ room, he said.

Police found Mr. Reynolds, now 35, eating and watching television on a mattress on his otherwise unlit room’s floor. He denied any knowledge of what had happened to Mr. Roberts, the officers said.

But Mark Herr, an assistant county prosecutor, said in his opening remarks that after several hours of questioning, Mr. Reynolds confessed to fatally beating Mr. Roberts and putting his body on the tracks.

Mr. Reynolds has entered both not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity pleas and waived his right to a trial by jury. Judge Duhart had declared him unfit for trial in the matter last year, then in March found him fit.

Defense lawyer Mark Geudtner said in his opening remarks that Mr. Reynolds had “a severe mental disease that affected his ability to confront and deal with reality.”

He said his case will demonstrate Mr. Roberts engaged in “a serious pattern of provocation” and that his client may have acted in self-defense, might be guilty of an offense less serious than murder, and may have been unable “to comprehend the wrongfulness” of his action.

Contact David Patch at: dpatch@theblade.com or 419-724-6094.

First Published December 8, 2015, 5:00 a.m.