Planned Parenthood shooter to get mental evaluation

During the court hearing, Dear said he distrusted his lawyers and demanded to serve as his own attorney. “I invoke my constitutional right to defend myself”, he said.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Judge Gilbert Martinez ordered Dear to undergo a mental competency evaluation, which he refused. “How can I trust my attorney when he says in the newspaper that I’m incompetent?” he continued, while stating that evaluators would aim to medicate him and “make me a zombie”.

Dear was apparently referring in his remarks to media coverage of his earlier court appearance, in which his public defender, Daniel King, told the judge, “I can not represent that Mr. Dear is competent”.

Martinez at one point warned Dear that whatever he said could be used against him and advised him to trust his lawyers.

The judge did not rule on Dear’s request, but instead ordered a mental health evaluation – one that could take months to complete due to a backlog at a state hospital in Pueblo.

The defendant, a SC native who once earned a living as a self-employed art salesman, stands accused of 179 felony counts, including charges of first-degree murder, attempted murder and assault.

Dear repeatedly disrupted his previous court appearance, declaring himself guilty and “a warrior for the babies”.

The prosecution, who has not yet announced their expected death penalty quest, objected to the delay.

Dear wants to represent himself and wants to fire his attorney, public defender, Dan King, who also represented Aurorar theater shooter, James Holmes.

Ke’Arre Stewart, Jennifer Markovsky and University of Colorado at Colorado Springs police Officer Garrett Swasey died in the attack at the city’s lone Planned Parenthood clinic.

On Wednesday, he claimed he was being poisoned in jail and urged the judge to have a sample of his hair tested to “see if there’s any drugs that have been put into my system while I’ve been in jail”.

A man who has acknowledged killing three people at a Colorado Planned Parenthood clinic says he wants to represent himself in legal proceedings.

Authorities have revealed little about the preparations behind the attack.