State v. Heptinstall

EXUM, Justice.

Defendant raises three questions: whether the trial court erred in finding defendant competent to proceed to trial, in refusing to conduct a new hearing on defendant’s competency after he testified, and in placing on defendant the burden of proving his insanity at the time of the incidents giving rise to the charges at issue. We conclude no error was committed and defendant received a fair trial.

Mrs. Rachel Albritton, a resident of the Lizzie community of Greene County, 1 was found by a neighbor in the yard of her home on 11 July 1981. She had been beaten and stabbed, but she…