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Baumhammers incompetent to stand trial, psychiatrist says
Wednesday, May 10, 2000 By Jim McKinnon, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
Richard S. Baumhammers, charged with killing five people and critically wounding another in an April 28 shooting rampage, is not competent to stand trial, a psychiatrist testified yesterday.
Dr. Christine Martone of the Allegheny County Behavior Clinic, testifying at a competency hearing yesterday, said that Baumhammers suffers from paranoid schizophrenia, a condition that makes him delusional and unable to assist his defense attorney at trial.
Baumhammers, an immigration lawyer who was out of work, faces charges that include the homicides, attempted homicide, aggravated assault, arson, ethnic intimidation, reckless endangerment, and weapons violations.
One of his victims was his neighbor, a Jewish woman, another was a black man from Aliquippa, and four were immigrants who are ethnic minorities in the United States.
Since the arrest, the judge and attorneys have determined that Baumhammers has a history of mental illness. He was treated for two or three weeks in 1993 at UPMC Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic in Oakland and in 1999 at St. Clair Hospital in Mt. Lebanon for an equal amount of time for schizophrenia, according to his statements in an interview with Martone May 2.
Martone testified that Baumhammers also said that he had been treated within the last several months as an outpatient at Western Psych. He was able to tell her that he was prescribed two psychotropic drugs, Trilifon and Ativan, to control his illness.
Martone said that while Baumhammers' answers were articulate, he remained terse, a symptom of his paranoia.
Martone said that Baumhammers suffers from auditory hallucinations.
He told her that while he was making photocopies or while he was at a law library, he heard people talking about him. Martone said he told her their intent was to interrupt his work.
"His reality testing is so poor that he thought these things were really happening," Martone testified.
"He also said he was poisoned," Martone added. "It is my expert opinion that he would be unable to cooperate during the process of a court trial."
Assistant District Attorney Edward Borkowski pressed Martone, but she never broke a sweat in the sweltering courtroom where the air conditioner had to be turned off. Witnesses could not be heard over the din of the cooling system because the microphones were not working properly.
Borkowski pointed out that Baumhammers refused to discuss the facts of the case. His attorneys had advised him not to.
Martone said that even though Baumhammers followed his lawyer's advice, Baumhammers did not necessarily exhibit signs of competency. She said that he could be lucid for a sentence or two, but he was easily distracted and he remained limited in his responses.
Martone acknowledged that a better diagnosis could be made if she had access to Baumhammers' medical and psychiatric records from Western Psych and St. Clair Hospital. Martone said, however, that her diagnosis was based on about 85 minutes of examining Baumhammers over two days and that she was convinced of her findings.
O'Toole on Monday granted a motion by Borkowski to have those records disclosed, but yesterday he rescinded that order after attorneys from the two hospitals objected.
Robert DelGreco, an attorney for the two hospitals, said yesterday that treating physicians are reluctant to be subjected to questioning in criminal trials because it could damage their standing with other patients and their confidentiality.
Borkowski, after yesterday's proceeding, renewed his request to see those records.
O'Toole will consider that motion after the competency hearing resumes, which will be sometime after the report from Stile has been completed. It was not known when that report will be completed.
Baumhammers remains at the Allegheny County Jail where he is being held without bail.
Martone said that he has been receiving low doses of the last medications that he is known to have been prescribed by his doctors.
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