Re Beam

[2006] QMHC 23

MENTAL HEALTH COURT

CITATION:

Re Beam  [2006] QMHC 023

PARTIES:

REFERENCE BY THE DEFENDANT’S LEGAL REPRESENTATIVE IN RESPECT OF LUKE BEAM

PROCEEDING:

No 189 of 2005

DELIVERED ON:

25 September 2006

DELIVERED AT:

Brisbane

HEARING DATE:

18 September 2006

JUDGE:

Philippides J

ASSISTING PSYCHIATRISTS:

Dr J F Wood
Dr J M Lawrence

FINDINGS AND ORDER:

1. That the defendant was not of unsound mind at the      
    time of the alleged offences
2. That the defendant is fit for trial

3. That the proceedings continue according to law

CATCHWORDS:

MENTAL HEALTH – DECLARATION OR FINDING OF MENTAL ILLNESS OR INCAPACITY – where defendant charged with attempted murder and other offences – where defendant has received several diagnoses over the years, including schizophrenia – whether defendant was of unsound mind as defined in schedule 2 of the Mental Health Act 2000 (Qld) at the time of the offences – whether defendant fit for trial

Mental Health Act 2000 (Qld), schedule 2

COUNSEL:

Ms S Ryan for the Defendant
Mr W Isdale for the Director of Mental Health

Mr P Feeney for the Director of Public Prosecutions

SOLICITORS:

Legal Aid Queensland for the Defendant
The Crown Solicitor for the Director of Mental Health

The Director of Public Prosecutions (Qld)

1. PHILIPPIDES J:  The defendant, Luke Beam is charged with eight offences alleged to have occurred on 8 April 2005; namely attempted murder, grievous bodily harm, unlawful wounding, going armed to cause fear, stealing and three counts of threatening violence.  In addition, he is charged with receiving between 28 and 31 March 2005 and with committing fraud on 30 March 2005.

1. The matter of the defendant’s mental condition in respect of these offences was referred to this Court by the defendant’s legal representative.  Psychiatric reports were provided by Drs Colls, van de Hoef and Reddan, who all also gave oral evidence.  

The Charges of March 2005

1. As to the charges of receiving and fraud in March 2005, the psychiatric evidence does not support a defence of unsound mind and in respect of those offences, I am satisfied that the defendant was not of unsound mind within the meaning of the Mental Health Act 2000 (Qld). I am satisfied on the evidence that the defendant is fit for trial and I order that the proceedings for those matters continue according to law.

The Charges of April 2005

1. As to the charges arising from the events of 8 April 2005 there is a divergence in the clinical opinions that have been provided to the court; Dr Colls supported a defence of unsoundness of mind, while Drs van de Hoef and Reddan did not.

1. The circumstances of the charges alleged against the defendant on 8 April 2005 are that the defendant met his mother for lunch at an inner-city restaurant as had been arranged either that morning or the previous day.  Soon after they were seated at the restaurant, the defendant took a hunting knife from a bag which he had taken to the restaurant and used it to stab his mother several times in the head and upper body.  He threatened to harm fellow patrons who moved to restrain him, before fleeing the scene. 

1. The defendant gave a police interview on 9 April 2005, in which he provided a very detailed account of his movements relating to the attack and subsequently.  In the interview the defendant stated that after the attack he was very calm and composed.  He threw the knife into a nearby bin outside the restaurant and discarded his ID in another bin, before entering a Target store where he stole some clothes.  These he used to replace his bloodstained clothes, which he threw under a rack.  He then travelled to the Gold Coast changing buses a number of times.  He went for a walk along the beach and had a swim and then, using a false name, booked into a hotel, where he stayed the night.  The following day he travelled to Tweed Heads, using a variety of transport.  He went to a church, participated in a prayer meeting and bible studies and had lunch, before turning himself in to the Coolangatta police station.

1. In his police interview, the defendant repeatedly explained his motivation for the attack as an intentional, planned and premeditated revenge for his mother’s past misconduct and abuse towards him.  He stated “that the whole thing was planned, premeditated, intentional and deliberate and it was perfect planning”.  He blamed his mother for bringing him in to the world and for destroying his life.  He stated that he had purchased the knife on the morning before the attack with the intention of “putting her to death”.  He said that when he met his mother he was, “filled with revenge and rage and anger” and used the knife “to strike back at her as an act of vengeance or revenge in relation to what she did to me as a child, because she verbally and physically abused me as a child”.   He expressed no remorse and stated that he made no apology whatsoever for what he did because his mother deserved it.

1. He told police that he believed that he had fatally wounded his mother and ceased attacking her because he believed he had inflicted sufficient blows to cause her death.  He gave details of his conduct after the stabbing, stating “I thought I would give the authorities a good run for their money and I realised that I’ve … eluded the authorities in Brisbane by changing clothes at Target, catching one bus, another bus, another bus, a taxi, and another bus over into the border.  If I had more money I still would have been on the run ….”.  He also explained that he knew he had nowhere to go and said that his life was over and that it had come to “a complete end”.  He expressed extreme self-loathing, stating, “I hate myself because I’m not human” and “it is not so much who I am but it is what I am that disturbs me”. 

1. He told the police and the reporting psychiatrists that he had been thinking about taking his revenge against his mother for some time, but was waiting for the right time to strike.  He said he fixed on 8 of April 2005 because it would coincide with the funeral of Pope John Paul II.  He expected his mother to die from her injuries and that the funeral would have taken place on that date also.   An audio tape of the police interview was tendered and played at the hearing of the reference for the benefit of the reporting psychiatrists and the Court.

1. The defendant has received several diagnoses over the years including schizophrenia, schizophrenic psychosis, drug-induced psychosis, antisocial personality traits and poly-drug dependence and has a history of self-harm and suicide attempts.

Dr Colls

1. Dr Colls saw the defendant on 17 June 2005 and provided reports dated 14 August 2005 and 8 August 2006.  He diagnosed chronic paranoid schizophrenia and antisocial personality disorder, probably present from early adulthood and present at the time of the alleged offences.  He considered the defendant was still psychotic at the time of interview.  In his report, Dr Colls described the defendant’s presentation as that of a careful, emotionally restricted man whose speech was stilted with an archaic vocabulary, restricted affect and formal thought disorder, but in oral evidence withdrew the later description of the defendant’s manner of speaking.  Dr Colls noted that the defendant reported intermittent persecutory ideas, paranoia, auditory hallucinations, a variety of religious experiences and an ability to ‘tell’ if people are talking about him.

1. In his report of 14 August 2005 Dr Colls expressed the view that the defendant had developed the delusional idea that his mother was responsible for his life’s misfortunes.  He opined that the defendant’s decision to attempt to kill his mother was a product of both persecutory delusional ideas about his mother and beliefs regarding the imminency of the end of the world and that the defendant’s schizophrenia deprived him of the capacity to know that he ought not to do the acts.  However, when giving evidence, Dr Colls preferred to withdraw the opinion that the defendant’s ideas about his mother were delusional, stating there was no evidence on the matter.

1. Dr Colls accepted that there was a degree of planning in the defendant’s conduct but disagreed with the proposition that it was inconsistent with a deprivation of capacity as a result of psychosis and stated that the subsequent evasion of authorities could not be considered “well planned”.  Dr Colls emphasised that he was the only one of the court examiners who was able to see the defendant when free from the influence of antipsychotic medication.  He emphasised in particular what he considered to be the defendant’s almost complete lack of affective response and stressed the significantly different presentation of the defendant when assessed by him compared with the other examiners.  While accepting that it was not very diagnostic of schizophrenia, he also placed weight on the defendant’s stilted and careful manner in an interview conducted for nearly two hours, observing that he had not seen such a narrative where a patient did not have schizophrenia.  He stated that the defendant did not labour his hallucinatory experiences and referred to the defendant’s response to antipsychotic medication, while accepting it was not necessarily diagnostic of a psychotic disorder. 

1. Having considered the reports of Drs van de Hoef and Reddan, Dr Colls adhered to his primary diagnosis of schizophrenia and maintained his view that the defendant was of unsound mind at the relevant time, with the “diagnostically necessary factor being the religious delusions regarding the imminency of the end of the world”. Although he accepted that the defendant may well have harboured longstanding resentment towards his mother, he considered that it was the defendant’s preoccupation with the end of the world, as marked by the funeral of the Pope, that provided the delusional trigger for his conduct.

Dr van de Hoef

1. Dr van de Hoef saw the defendant on 13 January 2006 and provided a report of the same date.  At interview she found the defendant to have an idiosyncratic and emphatic style of communication, which she observed was also present in the police interview, but observed no formal thought disorder.  His insight and judgment were intact.  The defendant described longstanding probably delusional persecutory beliefs.  He reported hearing “demonic voices” in his head telling him to kill his mother, but was unable to elaborate on the voices and also stated that “he wanted to kill” his mother, stating that he felt “no remorse, regret or shame” about what he had done because the abuse meted out to him by his mother was so severe, and she had ruined his life.  He denied any continuing homicidal thoughts towards his mother or anyone else.  He said that his feelings of hatred, revenge and anger toward his mother had settled somewhat and that they “were even (or) square”.  Although he felt a failure with a bleak future, he did not report any suicidal ideation.

1. Dr van de Hoef diagnosed chronic drug abuse and dependence.  She also considered his history and presentation indicated a severe personality disorder (borderline/antisocial type) which may well have arisen from a childhood of abuse and unstable attachments and which is characterized by lifelong difficulties in interpersonal relationships, antisocial and irresponsible behaviour, affective instability, lack of conscience or remorse, inappropriate or intense anger and recurrent suicidal threats and gestures. 

1. Dr van de Hoef considered that it was likely that the defendant had been psychotic on a number of occasions in his life and that these occasions of paranoid ideation and delusions, hallucinations, depressive mood disturbance and disorganisation were best explained as effects of drug intoxication or possibly episodes of drug induced psychosis.

1. However, Dr van de Hoef stated that she was unable to discover evidence of psychosis at the time of the offences.  In giving evidence she noted that the only psychotic indication was a simple statement at the end of the defendant’s police interview of feelings of persecutory delusions that people were plotting against him.  Dr van de Hoef emphasised that although the defendant now reported “delusions about the end of the world”, and command hallucinations from “demons”, these featured in none of the material gathered around the time of the offences.  In this regard, she also referred to the assessments conducted on 12 April 2005 by Dr Siddle and on 19 April 2005 by Dr Shuer, both of whom were unable to find evidence of psychotic illness nor of delusional thinking.

1. Dr van de Hoef explained in oral evidence that she examined the defendant in August 2005 (for the purposes of providing a second opinion in respect of the prescription of medication which had been requested by the defendant) and had been prepared to consider the presence of some underlying schizophrenic illness, but that by January 2006 she had moved to the view that the defendant was not suffering from a schizophrenic illness or other mental illness at the relevant time.  She firmly maintained that opinion, but also stated her clinical opinion that, even if it were accepted that the defendant was suffering from schizophrenia at the relevant time, there was no evidence that it had resulted in a deprivation of any of the relevant capacities.  In her view, the defendant knew the nature of the act, planned it, carried it out in an organised way to maximise the chances of success and then took many steps to avoid capture.  She considered the defendant knew he ought not do the acts but chose to and that there was no evidence of deprivation of control, but to the contrary, there was ample evidence that the defendant had substantial control of his actions, waiting for a specific opportunity to strike at his mother.

Dr Reddan

1. Dr Reddan saw the defendant on 19 May 2006.  She described his style of communication as somewhat idiosyncratic, but not bizarre, and explainable by his cultural and religious background.  Dr Reddan observed no restriction in his lability of affect and no evidence of significant disorganisation of thinking process, nor formal thought disorder.  She observed a significant degree of poignant sadness and existential despair, but no reporting of any specific suicidal planning or ideation. The defendant expressed himself quite vehemently and freely described bitter, vengeful and hostile feelings towards his mother. While his thought content suggested persecutory ideation, there was no evidence of clear persecutory delusional thinking. Although the defendant reported extensive “messages” and “voices”, Dr Reddan considered his account unconvincing; lacking in detail and inconsistent with the reported longstanding resentment towards his mother. 

1. Dr Reddan observed that the defendant’s longitudinal history suggested a complex psychopathology which did not fit easily into a neat nosological category.  She considered that it was likely that the defendant suffered from psychotic episodes but that it was unclear whether these occurred as a result of schizophrenia.  She inclined to the view that his longitudinal history and presentation suggested personality disorder with borderline and antisocial traits.  While she noted that the defendant now reports experiencing auditory hallucinations at the time of the alleged offences, and that he believed that after the Pope’s death the world would end, and that there would be a second coming of Christ, he was vague about how they related to his attempt to kill his mother.  She considered there was little convincing evidence that psychotic phenomena underlay or drove his decision to kill his mother. 

1. It was also her opinion that even if the defendant was suffering from a mental illness, the defendant was not at the relevant time deprived of any of the capacities; he intended to kill his mother or at least commit grievous bodily harm, he knew that it was both legally and morally wrong, but felt entitled to engage in the behaviour because of what he perceived to be the ruination of his life by his mother, and was sufficiently in control of his actions that when he saw his mother he did not immediately attack her, but waited for an opportune moment to act. 

Conclusions

1. As can be seen, Drs van de Hoef and Reddan were unable to support Dr Colls’ diagnosis of schizophrenia or of deprivation of any of the relevant capacities. Dr Colls ultimately based his conclusion that the defendant was of unsound mind at the relevant time upon his view that the defendant was acting on a delusion as to the end of the world.  However, he conceded that the defendant had provided little detail of that delusion, and, as the other reporting psychiatrists additionally observed, the delusion did not feature in the police interview (other than obliquely in respect of a reference to the Pope’s funeral).  Furthermore, while Dr Colls considered upon his examination of the defendant that he continued to display symptoms indicative of schizophrenia and considered that his examination was closer in time to the alleged offences than the examinations by the other reporting psychiatrists, the examinations closest in time were those conducted by Drs Siddle and Shuer.  Their examinations, while not as lengthy perhaps as Dr Colls’, were nevertheless extensive and revealed no psychotic symptoms.  Against the view of an operative mental illness accounting for the defendant’s conduct are the extensive statements by the defendant explaining his actions in terms of revenge for longstanding grievances against his mother, involving premeditation and planning.

1. In the circumstances, I am unable to be persuaded to the requisite degree of satisfaction that the defendant was at the time of the alleged offences suffering from a mental illness, nor that there was a relevant deprivation of capacity resulting from such an illness.  I observe that neither of the assisting psychiatrists was able to conclude on the material before the Court, that a finding of unsoundness of mind was supportable to the requisite standard. 

1. I find that the defendant did not suffer from unsoundness of mind at the time of the alleged offences.  I find that the defendant is fit for trial. Accordingly, I order that the proceedings continue according to law.