Fetus-snatching suspect is mentally ill, experts testify

KANSAS CITY, Missouri (AP) -- Defense attorneys for a woman accused of killing an expectant mother and cutting the baby from her womb rested their case after mental health experts testified that she did not know what she was doing.

Lisa Montgomery, 39, did not take the stand in her federal trial on a charge of kidnapping resulting in death. Prosecutors were to continue their rebuttal when proceedings resume Thursday.

Montgomery's lawyers have not denied that their client killed Bobbie Jo Stinnett on December 16, 2004, and sliced the baby from her womb. But they say Montgomery suffers from mental illnesses, including one that caused her to believe she was pregnant despite having a tubal ligation.

Prosecutors say Montgomery is faking mental illness to escape a possible death sentence, which they plan to pursue if she is convicted.

Two defense experts testified Wednesday that Montgomery suffered from pseudocyesis, which causes a woman to falsely believe she is pregnant and exhibit some outward signs of pregnancy. Both said they believed Montgomery was acting to protect the delusion when she attacked Stinnett in the victim's home in Skidmore.

Montgomery was arrested the next day at her Melvern, Kansas, home after showing off the baby around town.

In an apparent attempt to undermine the insanity defense, prosecutors repeatedly questioned the defense experts about why Montgomery changed her account of the killing. Initially, Montgomery told investigators she acted alone, but this year she began telling mental health experts that her brother, Tommy Lee Kleiner, was with her.

Both sides have said that was impossible because Kleiner had been meeting with a parole officer at the time of the killing.

Dr. Vilayanur Ramachandran, director of the Center for Brain and Cognition at the University of California, San Diego, told jurors that the inconsistencies support the diagnoses. He said Montgomery would have given a consistent account of the killing if she were trying to mislead experts.

"What she is trying to do is emotionally distance herself from the crime, so she attributes it to someone else," Ramachandran said.

The other defense mental health expert, Dr. William Logan, offered a similar explanation, saying the differing accounts are "based on her total inability to come to grips with what she had done."

Logan, a psychiatrist, testified that Montgomery began escaping into fantasy to deal with a chaotic childhood that included sexual abuse and frequent moves.

He said the false pregnancies began shortly after Montgomery underwent a tubal ligation in 1990. Although forms she signed at the hospital indicated she wanted the procedure, Montgomery later believed she had been pressured by her mother and ex-husband, Logan testified.

He said Montgomery had a tendency to base her beliefs on feelings, not reality.

"Her thinking is plastic enough that if she imagines it long enough, it can be truth," he said.

Dr. Daniel Martell, a rebuttal witness for the prosecution, testified that tests he and two other mental health experts administered showed Montgomery was exaggerating some symptoms of mental illness. Martell determined Montgomery had been faking mental illness to help her defense.

"I think she is a manipulative woman who will say what she needs in a situation to turn it to her advantage," he testified.

If Montgomery is found not guilty by reason of insanity, she would undergo a mental evaluation and a judge would decide if she will be released or committed to a mental institution. E-mail to a friend

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