DECATUR, Ga.,None — After a two-day hiatus, testimony in the Hemy Neuman murder trial resumed Thursday morning with a forensic psychiatrist who described Neuman's symptoms of having a mood disorder.
First thing Thursday morning, Neuman's defense requested the judge grant a mistrial because prosecutors asked a defense psychologist hypothetical questions, but Judge Gregory Adams denied the motion and said he will continue to allow the prosecution to ask hypotheticals.
Neuman is on trial on charges that he shot and killed Rusty Sneiderman in front of a Dunwoody day care in 2010.
Although his attorneys have admitted that Neuman was the gunman, he has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity.
Following Adams' ruling on the defense's motions, Dr. Tracey Marks, a forensic psychiatrist, was sworn in.
"It is my opinion that Mr. Neuman was unable to distinguish between right and wrong in relation to the events," Marks said. "He did not think that was he was doing was wrong."
Marks said Neuman suffered from bipolar disorder. She cited an extended conversation with Neuman about his childhood with an abusive father, and his feeling of being "unmothered."
Marks explained that she always goes into a forensic evaluation with a degree of skepticism, because often the patients have a reason to want to be considered mentally ill.
Neuman's attorneys have said that he was haunted by demons. Marks testified that Neuman's first depressive episode happened while he was spending a holiday alone in a shack in Israel when he was 13 years old. She described several other depressive episodes Neuman told her about, including one in February 2010, during which the "shack demon" returned, and told him to commit suicide.
Marks said Neuman told her his relationship with Sneiderman's wife, Andrea Sniederman, became romantic while the pair was on a work-related trip to Lake Tahoe. Marks said he told her when he returned home from the trip, he saw an angel that told him Andrea Sneiderman's children were his own.
He said the same angel later told him that the children were being abandoned and needed his protection, Marks testified.
The defense's insanity plea hinges on claims that Neuman believed that by shooting Rusty Sneiderman, he was protecting what he thought were his own children.
Andrea Sneiderman testified that although she knew Neuman was romantically interested in her, the two never had a relationship beyond that of an employee and her boss.
http://bcove.me/uv7ds43l