'Chicken whackers' aliens' signals surface in stabbing trial
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Wednesday, March 15, 2006
Bipolar disorder is a chronic, recurring disorder that cannot be cured, and it is the reason Troy Mondragon attempted to kill a man in 2003, according to a Grand Junction psychiatrist.
Robert Sammons, who has a medical degree in addition to a doctorate in psychiatry, testified on behalf of the defense Wednesday in Mondragon’s trial. He said he believes Mondragon was having a psychotic episode when Mondragon stabbed Nate Swartzell 27 times early in the morning of March 23, 2003.
Swartzell survived to identify Mondragon as his assailant.
Mondragon pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to the charges of attempted first-degree murder, first-degree assault, first-degree burglary and second-degree burglary.
If he is found guilty, he could be sentenced to as many as 48 years in prison.
Sammons testified Wednesday he has read the reports of five other psychiatrists who found Mondragon sane and competent. Of those five, three work for the state mental hospital. Three testified Mondragon is faking his symptoms.
Sammons said the state psychiatrists didn’t properly research Mondragon’s history, and therefore failed to do the evaluations correctly.
“You can fake an interview,” Sammons said. “You can’t fake a history.”
Moreover, Sammons testified he found “multiple examples of symptoms” of mental illness in the reports of the other psychiatrists.
Symptoms for bipolar disorder don’t present themselves all the time, Sammons said. They can be dormant most of the time, he said.
“The fact that he does not have the symptoms when it’s convenient for the hospital to do a diagnosis does not mean he does not have bipolar disorder,” Sammons testified.
A diagnosis of faking a mental illness must be made in the absence of a mental illness, Sammons said. Sammons said Mondragon’s claims to have worked for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, to communicate with aliens, to be using his watch to signal and receive signals from aliens, his talking to himself and other symptoms show he has a psychosis.
“Signaling aliens with his Indiglo watch ... I’ll accept that as delusional,” Sammons testified.
Mondragon believed he was a “soldier for Jesus” and that the victim worshipped the devil, Sammons said.
“Troy Mondragon told me the chicken whackers killed a brother, chopped his head off and put the head on a stick, and they had talked to him,” Sammons testified.
Mondragon also showed a fear of “chicken whackers” and was sleep-deprived as a result of mourning the death of his friend and stayed up for four days before the crime. Sleep-deprivation can cause psychosis, he said.
No one defined “chicken whackers” at the trial.
Those symptoms showed up in Mondragon’s life long before the March 23, 2003, crime, Sammons said.
On cross-examination, Assistant District Attorney Rich Tuttle alleged Sammons predetermined Mondragon’s insanity before accepting Mondragon as a client.
As a response to a juror’s question, Sammons testified the clients he has accepted met the criteria for insanity, “Or I wouldn’t have taken them.”
The report done by the first psychiatrist Mondragon saw after the crime did not mention memory loss, sleep deprivation and other symptoms of mania the defendant later reported to Sammons, Tuttle said.
“I found that somewhat strange,” Sammons said.
It was not significant that Mondragon’s symptoms seemed to grow over time, because he has been consistent with some of the delusions, Sammons testified.
Also Wednesday, Mondragon’s sister-in-law Tiffany Mondragon testified that Troy Mondragon used his watch to “communicate with the mother ship.
He wasn’t joking. There was no laughing.”
A former mental health worker at the Mesa County Jail, Roxanne Sarmento, testified that jail personnel treated Mondragon unfairly.
Marija B. Vader can be reached via e-mail at mva...@gjds.com.