Santa Fe suspect not fit for trial
Three experts declare alleged shooter to be incompetent for court
GALVESTON — The young man charged with capital murder in the Santa Fe High School shooting rampage that left eight students and two teachers dead has been declared incompetent to stand trial by three separate psychiatric experts, his attorney said Monday, meaning he likely will be sent to a mental health facility for evaluation.
The accused gunman, 19-yearold Dimitrios Pagourtzis, was evaluated independently by three experts, all of whom agreed that he was not fit to stand trial in his current mental state, said Nick Poehl, one of the defense attorneys in the case. Prosecutors will not contest that finding, Poehl said.
State District Judge John Ellisor still has to sign off on the experts’ findings to officially declare Pagourtzis incompetent to stand trial, which Poehl expects to happen this week.
The judge has “indicated he’s going to (sign the order), there’s no reason to contest it, everybody’s in agreement he’s not competent,” Poehl said.
Poehl previously had not ruled out filing an insanity plea, and prosecutors in June asked the judge if they could commission their own mental health evaluation of Pagourtzis in anticipation of a possible insanity plea. The defense did not object, and Ellisor signed the order June 5.
Evaluations of competency to stand trial speak to a suspect’s state of mind at the time that a tri
al would begin, while an insanity plea addresses the suspect’s state of mind at the time of a crime.
Galveston County District Attorney Jack Roady declined to comment on the experts’ findings, saying only that his office was spending the day reaching out to families of the shooting victims with the news.
Steve Perkins, whose wife, Ann, a substitute teacher, was gunned down as she ushered students in her gym class to safety on the morning of the shootings, said he doesn’t believe Pagourtzis lacks understanding of what happened.
“I think it’s an injustice,” Perkins said. “I believe he knew what he was doing (when the shooting happened), and he knows what he’s doing now.”
Pagourtzis is charged with capital murder in the shooting spree that killed 10 and wounded 13 in May 2018. Pagourtzis, a junior at the high school at the time, admitted to being the mass shooter after his arrest, according to court documents. Classmates described him as a quiet student who played junior varsity football and was an honor roll student.
Witnesses said Pagourtzis entered the school with a long, dark trench coat that he frequently wore, concealing what police later identified as his father’s sawed-off Remington shotgun and a .38 pistol. He planted explosives that did not detonate and selected his targets so as to spare the students he liked, he later told police.
Pagourtzis faces life in prison with the possibility of parole after 40 years if convicted.
Poehl had filed a motion in August requesting an independent psychiatrist evaluate Pagourtzis. Poehl cited “recent observations” and conversations with Pagourtzis in which he displayed
“no understanding of the matter and proceedings,” as well as ongoing evaluations by mental health professionals.
Ellisor agreed Monday to lift a gag order for the prosecution and defense that had been in place during the time Pagourtzis was being evaluated for competency.
Pagourtzis will eventually be transferred to a state mental health facility where he will be treated and evaluated over four to six months, delaying his forthcoming Feb. 18 trial in Richmond.
“Basically the trial is on hold,” Poehl said. “He has to be sent to a state psychiatric hospital to be treated with a goal towards having him regain competency.”
Pagourtzis is being held in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day at the Galveston County Jail and had undergone regular psychiatric evaluations by experts paid for by his defense attorneys while in custody. These evaluations, however, were not intended to determine competency to stand trial.
The three experts who subsequently evaluated Pagourtzis’ competency were commissioned separately.
Pagourtzis’ attorneys hired Bradley Peterson, a child and adolescent psychiatrist based in Los Angeles, for their examination. The judge tapped Houston psychologist Karen Gollaher as the outside expert, independent of the prosecution and defense. The district attorney’s office selected Victor Scarano, a Houston-based forensic psychiatry expert, to conduct the third and final evaluation of Pagourtzis.
Poehl added that the three experts who evaluated Pagourtzis reached “certain conclusions about diagnoses” but declined to share those findings, citing privacy concerns.
There are several hurdles to clear before determining which mental health facility will evaluate Pagourtzis and when he will be transferred, in part because of the high-profile nature of the criminal charges and his pending federal charges.
Pagourtzis’ attorney previously told the Houston Chronicle that federal authorities plan to bring two new charges against Pagourtzis: a firearm charge and another for having an explosive device. Because Pagourtzis was 17 when the shooting occurred, he still is considered a juvenile under federal law, so information about his federal case is sealed.
In addition to Ellisor signing off on Pagourtzis’ transfer from the county jail, a federal judge would need to approve any move to a new facility because the suspect is technically in federal custody.
Poehl identified Rusk State Hospital and North Texas State Hospital in Vernon as the two most likely mental health facilities to hold Pagourtzis because both have maximum-security units.