By Ronnie Crocker
Houston Chronicle
HOUSTON, USA (MCT) — A federal judge on Wednesday ordered accused swindler Allen Stanford to remain in federal custody while
Allen Stanford in prison
undergoing treatment for drug addiction and further evaluation of his competence to stand trial.
US District Judge David Hittner ruled after a hearing earlier this month that Stanford cannot be tried until he undergoes detoxification from addictions to medications he’s received in jail.
Today Hittner put that in an order and recommended the government send Stanford to a federal Bureau of Prisons medical facility.
Yet while declaring Stanford “incompetent to stand trial at this time,” Hittner’s order admonished prosecutors and defense attorneys to “diligently prepare this case to proceed to trial.”
Stanford and other officers of his Houston-based Stanford Financial Group are accused of defrauding investors of $7 billion in a scheme based largely on certificates of deposit issued by a Stanford-owned bank on the Caribbean island of Antigua.
Stanford’s trial had been scheduled to begin this week, but it was delayed after the Jan. 6 hearing in which attorneys debated his ability to assist in his in defense.
Three psychiatrists, including one hired by the government, testified then that Stanford takes heavy doses of anti-anxiety and antidepressant drugs that render him incompetent to stand trial.
Defense attorneys had requested mental evaluations after Stanford was injured in a September 2009 altercation with a fellow inmate at a detention center in Conroe.
“Although the three psychiatrists could not identify the exact cause of Stanford’s diminished mental capacity, they opined it could be one or a combination of the following: (1) over-medication, which has led to an addiction; (2) brain damage caused by the head injury he sustained in September 2009; and/or (3) Major Depressive Disorder,” Hittner wrote in his order. “All three agreed Stanford should be withdrawn from his medications.”
The doctors estimated it could take two weeks to six months to do this safely. Because of the potential for side-effects, the order states, all three recommended the defendant be treated at an in-patient psychiatric center.
Stanford has been held without bail as a flight risk since he was indicted in June 2009. Codefendants are free on bail.
His lawyers had asked that he be released on bail and allowed to stay home with an ankle monitor and check himself in for detoxification in a private Houston facility.
Attorneys involved in the case are prohibited from discussing it by court order. The Bureau of Prisons did not respond to a request for comment.
