United States v. Priscilla J. Deters

TACHA, Circuit Judge.

The defendant, Priscilla J. Deters, was indicted on various counts of mail and wire fraud. Before trial, the defendant’s counsel requested that a psychiatric examination be performed on the defendant in order to determine her mental competency to stand trial and to evaluate her degree of sanity at the time of the alleged crimes, pursuant to 18 U.S.C. §§ 4241 and 4242. Although the statutory scheme allows courts to temporarily confine defendants during such psychiatric evaluations, see id. § 4247(b), the defendant asked to be examined on an outpatient basis. The court…