Opinion ID: 2585200
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Experts' reports regarding defendant's competency

Text: Dr. Trompetter interviewed defendant at the Stanislaus County Jail for a total of two and one-half hours on July 21 and 23, 1989. He also reviewed the records of the Stanislaus County Sheriffs Department, defendant's records from the Stanislaus County Mental Health Department, and defendant's discharge summary from Atascadero State Hospital, and briefly contacted Detective Deckard of the Stanislaus County Sheriffs Department. Based on information gathered from these sources, Dr. Trompetter wrote and submitted a report in which he concluded defendant was competent to stand trial. Dr. Trompetter noted defendant had reported two prior psychiatric hospitalizations: a March 1978 commitment to Atascadero State Hospital, following a finding of not guilty by reason of insanity on a charge of assault with a deadly weapon on a peace officer, from which defendant was discharged in 1982; and, in January 1985, a 72 hour involuntary hospitalization at the Stanislaus County Department of Mental Health Psychiatric Health Facility. Both institutions reported a diagnosis of schizophrenia, paranoid type, but Dr. Trompetter noted that the reports he reviewed did not clearly specify the basis for the diagnosis and that some of the information he received actually undermined such a diagnosis. [6] In his July 21, 1989, examination of defendant, Dr. Trompetter found no clinical evidence of schizophrenia. [7] Defendant did, however, demonstrate many paranoid beliefs, which may have contributed to the diagnoses of schizophrenia. Dr. Trompetter described defendant as a pridefully independent person who seems highly insulated, very skeptical, cynical, and mistrustful of the motives of others, especially attorneys and women, and as having a tendency to magnify minor details into proofs of treachery. Dr. Trompetter found defendant's beliefs about women possibly delusional: Defendant claims that many women are transvestites or lesbians, and he seems to believe that their presence on a jury would heighten the likelihood that he will be convicted. He claims to not know a sure-fire way of being able to identify those females that are so inclined and, thus, he is led to conclude that he should have a Court trial. He reports to believe that all women who are lesbians and transvestites also molest children. While he adds that he `may be wrong,' he maintains the belief with some degree of intensity. Seemingly connected to [defendant's] views regarding women, Dr. Trompetter found, are some of his religious beliefs. He claims to have decided as a youngster to emulate the beast from Revelation in an attempt to assist him in deciding whether there was truly a God. Dr. Trompetter found it difficult to determine the extent to which defendant's religious beliefs reflected delusional thinking, as opposed to some fundamentalist religious faith. In evaluating defendant's understanding of the proceedings against him, Dr. Trompetter found a very sophisticated awareness of the charges and their seriousness. He can accurately define the role of the judge, jury, district attorney, and defense attorney. He knows and can describe the purpose of a criminal proceeding and can define terms such as witness, testimony, and plea negotiation. He claims that he has no impairment in his memory that would preclude his ability to testify in his own behalf, if necessary. Similarly, he reports that he can assist in the cross-examination of prosecution witnesses if necessary. It is not necessarily predictable that he would be a management problem in the Courtroom, any more than his history of explosive and assaultive behavior would suggest. His manner and attitude during this examiner's evaluation indicates that he has the capacity to cooperate with defense counsel if he so chooses. In assessing defendant's preference for self-representation, Dr. Trompetter noted defendant acknowledged running a risk by choosing to defend himself because of his lack of knowledge of the law, but seems willing to take this chance. While it does not appear to be a prudent decision, it is not motivated by a psychotic delusion. Dr. Trompetter found less comprehensible defendant's preference for a court trial over a jury trial, informed as it appeared to be both by his possibly delusional beliefs regarding women and by his rationally articulated, albeit possibly incorrect, belief that the prosecution's evidence was unraveling and that a judge might more accurately than a jury assess a weak prosecution case. Dr. Trompetter stated: The degree to which these findings compromise his competency to assist in his own defense is returned to the Court. At defense counsel's request, licensed Psychologist Paul S.D. Berg, Ph.D., interviewed defendant for a substantial part of two days, on July 12 and 15, 1989, and evaluated records provided by counsel. Dr. Berg's letter-report to counsel diagnosed defendant as paranoid schizophrenic and concluded he was incompetent to stand trial. Dr. Berg found defendant's initial presentation to be that of a some-what phlegmatic, almost philosophical man, simply wrongfully accused but cynically and intellectually dealing with his feelings about that. [11] An examination of his life, however, very quickly reveals that there is more than meets the eye, as seen, for example, in his earliest childhood experiences in which he developed as an alienated and schizoid-appearing individual and the onset of a specific delusional system by the time he was 12 years old, consistent with the rest of his life as a peripherally functioning and very marginal individual. Dr. Berg found defendant to be so preoccupied with his mission against homosexuals that it totally distorts his own considerations and judgments about the existence or selection of a jury trial and his ability to cooperate with any counsel that would try to even advise him on such matters. Dr. Berg believed that on some very real level [defendant] may also wish to be executed, although he did not directly admit it. Dr. Berg also believed there is an underlying program in his life or script, so to speak, in which he has fantasied himself to be a soldier, and that he believes that if he were to be executed, he would finally have achieved the kind of martyrdom that he cannot effect in any more conventional or somewhat less destructive way. In addition to the diagnosis of schizophrenia, paranoid type, Dr. Berg noted the possibility of some secondary factors associated with an organic brain syndrome, which could not be confirmed due to defendant's resistance to the necessary examinations.