Faking Mental Instability
A former jailmate of Wallace testified that sometime in February or March 1980 Wallace told him he was using the Masons’ story to get out of going to trial and stated that he would act psychotic only when non-prisoners were present. Two jailmates from Vigo County, Lofston and St. John, testified that during 1980 Wallace would act perfectly normal unless the doctors were around. Wallace told them he was fooling the psychiatrist by telling them he was collaborating with the Germans. Lofston testified that sometimes Wallace would give his medication to him and other inmates and that it would make them drowsy. St. John testified that Wallace told him he was pretending to be crazy to evade trial. Wallace told St. John he saved up his medication for a hearing so he would be extremely drowsy in the courtroom.
Several of the staff members from Logansport State Hospital, where Wallace had been for most of the preceding two years, testified in the same manner. Robert Cosgray testified that when Wallace first came to the hospital he acted psychotic but shortly thereafter admitted to Cosgray that he was feigning his mental illness. Wallace later denied this statement and told Cosgray that it was Cosgray's word against his. He said he would rather spend his life in the hospital than go to the electric chair. William Hardesty testified Wallace exhibited his psychosis early in 1980, but later Wallace told Hardesty that he liked to "beat people at their own game." Further, Wallace told Hardesty that the longer he drags this out the less chance the state had of convicting him.
Others at Logansport, James Campbell, Deborah Illes, Wilma McLaughlin, Richard Younce, and William Conn, each testified that during the two years of Wallace's hospitalization they saw his alleged psychotic delusions manifested very rarely. He appeared to have psychotic delusions perhaps once or twice, and then only when Dr. Keating was present or about to enter the room. Several of the staff members stated that Wallace gave them a contrasting impression and he was a sharp pool and card player.
Read more about this topic: Donald Ray Wallace
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