Planned Parenthood Attack Suspect Says Lawyers Want Him Held Incompetent
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (CBS4) - From jail the man charged with killing three and wounding nine in the November attack on Planned Parenthood in Colorado Springs told CBS4 he believes the judge and his lawyers want him found mentally incompetent to stand trial.
Robert Dear is back in the El Paso County jail after a month away for a competency exam. CBS4 was not allowed to bring in a camera or recording device as reporter Rick Sallinger spoke to him on Monday on a video conference from the jail visitor center.
In December Dear had told the court he would not cooperate with psychiatrists saying "I'm not going to agree to their mental health evaluations." But on Monday he said during his stay at the state hospital in Pueblo he did cooperate with the exam. He claimed a doctor asked him to count backward from 100 by sevens and identify animals in pictures.
There are two parts to determine competency:
1. Are you able to understand the charges against you? Dear told CBS4 he was and knew there are 179 counts.
2. Are you able to assist in your own defense? He said that would not be necessary. Dear insisted he still wants to plead guilty, but believes his lawyers don't want that.
"If I plead not guilty by reason of insanity," Dear said, "That would diminish my cause."
He said he is not insane and the only one protecting what he called "the innocent." He said three psychiatrists have been sent to see him since he has been in jail. Two came by last week. He has refused to see them. Dear also claimed the FBI has been slipping people into the jail to talk with him surreptitiously. He claimed in a previous CBS4 interview the FBI has been following him for decades.
One thing he was not asked about in the state hospital exam was the Planned Parenthood attack, which he told CBS4 about by phone last month. "The goal was to stop babies from being slaughtered," he said in that interview. He said he had no remorse about killing three, including a police officer, to save 3,000.
When asked if he had suffered any remorse for the killings, Dear replied "They were in a bad place. A war zone."
On Monday when asked if he had been motivated for his admitted assault on the clinic by the secret recordings of Planned Parenthood made by anti-abortion activists before the attack, he said he hadn't seen them, but heard about that.
"That re-energized me in my mind," he said.
The report on the comptency exam is due to be given to the court in late March.
CBS4's Rick Sallinger is a Peabody award winning reporter who has been with the station more than two decades doing hard news and investigative reporting. Follow him on Twitter @ricksallinger.
