FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla., Dec. 20 (UPI) -- A South Florida teenage convicted child killer has been found mentally competent to face sentencing after psychologists testified he faked hearing voices.
One defense attorney for Lionel Tate, 18, acknowledged an older Broward County Jail inmate convinced Tate it would help his probation violation case if he faked mental illness, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported.
Tate claimed in a letter to acting Broward Circuit Judge Joel Lazarus that voices were telling him to commit suicide just days before Lazarus was to hear evidence on whether he should revoke Tate's probation for beating a 6-year-old girl to death when Tate was 12.
Psychologist Trudy Block-Garfield testified Tate acted "totally inconsistent" with people who have auditory hallucinations. Tate would slap his ear and repeatedly turn his head and say, "Stop it," she said, according to a Sun-Sentinel report.
Tate was released from prison in January 2004 after an appellate court overturned his first-degree murder conviction and accepted a plea to second-degree murder.
Tate returned to jail in May after he was accused of robbing a pizza delivery driver at gunpoint.
His probation violation hearing is set for Feb. 27.
