KPLC 7 News, Lake Charles, Louisiana |Lee's Lawyer Says He's Retarded

Lee's Lawyer Says He's Retarded

September 21, 2004
Reported by The Associated Press

Defense attorneys for Derrick Todd Lee say preliminary findings from a mental health expert show that Lee is mentally retarded. Mike Mitchell announced the information in court before the continuation of jury selection in the trial against Lee for the death of 22-year-old Charlotte Murray Pace.

The information could be used to try to spare Lee's life if he's convicted in the first-degree murder case. Lee would be ineligible for the death penalty if he's declared mentally retarded because of a U-S Supreme Court ruling barring the execution of mentally retarded criminals.

Mitchell says he received a single line e-mail from the mental health expert a day earlier but not a formal report. He says he's trying to obtain more information about the findings. First Assistant DA John Sinquefield says he was surprised by the information. He says he asked defense attorneys in August 2003 to inform him if they planned to argue that Lee be exempt from the death penalty for that reason.

Sinquefield says prosecutors are entitled to an independent evaluation of Lee, but he says the court has time to handle the matter without interfering with jury selection because any penalty phase -- if Lee is convicted -- still is weeks away.

Jury selection, meanwhile, is now in its second week, with nearly 30 potential jurors dismissed from a pool of more than 400.

Ten potential jurors have made it through questioning, but they still could be removed later by lawyers on either side as they work to assemble a 12-member jury with four alternates.