Thanks Matt, that does seem to be the solution. This works:

,convert(datetime, substring([timeOccurred],1,19)) as timeOccured

I appreciate your help.

I don't think the time zone is important because we do not need to be that precise in deleting data older than months. I've tried both cast and convert...

Thanks John. I did see that in BOL, but I am tripping on the syntax. There is not a clear example for converting character data to a datetime,...