THE head of the Central Mental Hospital has agreed that he had judged Mr Brendan O'Donnell at 14 years to be "very close to psychosis if not already there". Dr Charles Smith was being cross examined yesterday by Mr Patrick MacEntee SC, defending.
Mr O'Donnell's murder trial at the Central Criminal Court enters its 45th day today, which will make it the longest running murder trial of a single defendant in the history of the State.
Dr Smith agreed that anti psychotic medication was prescribed for Mr O'Donnell in 1988 when he was detained at Trinity House. Delusions appeared to fade following the treatment, suggesting the diagnosis was correct.
Dr Smith said he did not regard Mr O'Donnell as having a psychiatric illness when he saw him again in 1990 and on May 14th, 1994, one week after the bodies of Ms Imelda and Liam Riney and Father Joseph Walsh were discovered.
He was "pretty confident" about the absence of major mental illness at that time.
Dr Smith agreed he was incorrect when he told the court on Tuesday that Mr O'Donnell had ceased calling everyone Seamus after he was returned for trial in August 1994.
He said Mr O'Donnell was still calling people Seamus in October 1994. Dr Smith denied he was telling lies or seeking to mislead the jury. He said he had got the dates wrong.
He stuck by his suggestion that Mr O'Donnell was calling people Seamus to convey an impression of illness.
He agreed that notes at the Central Mental Hospital in Dundrum, Dublin, which recorded that psychiatrist Dr Gerry O'Neill had found Mr O'Donnell, to be "normal" in 1988 were inaccurate.
He also agreed that Dr O'Neill had suspected was psychotic. He denied the Central Mental Hospital notes were "a gross distortion."
Mr O'Donnell (21), a native of Co Clare but of no fixed abode, faces 12 charges. He has denied the murder of Ms Riney (29) and her three year old son between April 29th and May 8th, 1994. He also denies the murder of Father Walsh (37), the former curate of Eyrecourt, Co Galway.
Dr Smith said Mr O'Donnell was admitted to the Central Mental Hospital in November 1994 during a prolonged hunger strike.
He read a note by Dr Art O'Connor, dated November 18th 1994 that Mr O'Donnell said he wanted to die to get back to his mother.
The doctor had said Mr O'Donnell would probably be psychotic and depressed at times. He had said there was an element of manipulation but probably ill as well". Dr O'Connor had suggested trying an anti psychotic treatment and also an anti depressant.
Dr Smith said Mr O'Donnell was actually on largactyl, which is used as an anti psychotic drug, at that stage.
He said the drug did address organic psychosis but his main concern was to stimulate Mr O'Donnell's appetite. He was more concerned that Mr O'Donnell was on a serious hunger strike, which he believed he had decided on rationally.
Dr Smith told Mr MacEntee that his information had been that no command hallucinations were recorded for Mr O'Donnell until autumn 1994.
Mr MacEntee put to him that a medical report from Mountjoy prison dated May 29th, 1994 noted "no hallucinations now". He said this suggested there had been hallucinations between May 9th, 1994 and May 29th. Dr Smith agreed.
He said he and Dr Damian Mohan from the Central Mental Hospital would have made decisions about him when they saw him in May 1994.
He said both of them had judged Mr O'Donnell not to be psychiatrically ill. They regarded him as a management problem, not a psychiatric one, and would have started treatment if it was appropriate.
Dr Mohan had seen Mr O'Donnell on May 9th, 1994, he said. They had regarded him as very excited, animated and "a disturbed young man". He was almost an unmanageable prisoner" with a lot of hostility and aggression. They decided not to treat him as a sick man.
"It was a judgment I made. I can't reverse it nor would I want to," he said.
Dr Smith, agreed that when he saw Mr O Donnell in 1988 at Trinity House when he was 14, he had judged him to be "very close to psychosis, if not already there".
Dr Smith said he next saw Mr O Donnell in June 1990 after he was admitted to the Central Mental Hospital with a slashed wrist. He later bit the stitches out.
He said Mr O'Donnell was at the Central Mental Hospital for three months. There was "no evidence to worry us about psychosis" nothing to suggest psychiatric illness. They had diagnosed anti social personality.