PeoplesMind
09-25-2003, 11:52 PM
An Elgin man charged with stabbing two people in random attacks that rattled northwest suburban residents three years ago didn't seem impaired or insane when he approached a parked car and immediately attacked the driver with a steak knife, a witness testified Tuesday.
"He looked like a normal person," said Martha Avalos, describing the man who attacked her friend, Jorge Amaro, on Sept. 1, 2000, as Amaro stood near his car in the Tyler Creek Forest Preserve near Elgin. "He wasn't laughing or giggling."
Attorneys for Edward Edwardsen, now 20, aren't disputing that he carried out the stabbings. But they are contending that Edwardsen, then a 17-year-old senior at Jacobs High School in Algonquin, was insane and intoxicated on cough syrup when the assaults occurred near Elgin during the 2000 Labor Day weekend. His trial opened Tuesday in Kane County Circuit Court with eyewitness accounts of the two attacks
Much of the focus of the trial is expected to be on Edwardsen's mental state. Following his arrest, he spent nearly a year in the Elgin Mental Health Center after being found mentally unfit to stand trial. After Edwardsen was treated at that facility, he was found competent.
Defense attorney David Camic said mental health experts found at that time Edwardsen was suffering from hallucinations and hearing voices.
READ ARTICLE : http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-axe24.html
[Editor's Note : I e-mailed the author of this article to inquire about what type of cough syrup [codine based, DXM based, perhaps diphenhydramine/dramamine], and he replied in brielf by saying 'Robitussin.' I have been unable to verfiy any more information.
"He looked like a normal person," said Martha Avalos, describing the man who attacked her friend, Jorge Amaro, on Sept. 1, 2000, as Amaro stood near his car in the Tyler Creek Forest Preserve near Elgin. "He wasn't laughing or giggling."
Attorneys for Edward Edwardsen, now 20, aren't disputing that he carried out the stabbings. But they are contending that Edwardsen, then a 17-year-old senior at Jacobs High School in Algonquin, was insane and intoxicated on cough syrup when the assaults occurred near Elgin during the 2000 Labor Day weekend. His trial opened Tuesday in Kane County Circuit Court with eyewitness accounts of the two attacks
Much of the focus of the trial is expected to be on Edwardsen's mental state. Following his arrest, he spent nearly a year in the Elgin Mental Health Center after being found mentally unfit to stand trial. After Edwardsen was treated at that facility, he was found competent.
Defense attorney David Camic said mental health experts found at that time Edwardsen was suffering from hallucinations and hearing voices.
READ ARTICLE : http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-axe24.html
[Editor's Note : I e-mailed the author of this article to inquire about what type of cough syrup [codine based, DXM based, perhaps diphenhydramine/dramamine], and he replied in brielf by saying 'Robitussin.' I have been unable to verfiy any more information.