Doctors’ testimony key Nichols evidence

Testimony concluded Friday in the six-week trial of Brian Nichols. The case is expected to go to the jury next week. When it does, the testimony of two mental health experts —- psychologist Dr. Mark Cunningham and psychiatrist Dr. Robert Phillips —- may weigh heavily in jurors’ discussions as they decide whether Nichols should be convicted of murder in the deaths of Judge Rowland Barnes, court reporter Julie Brandau, Fulton County Sheriff’s Deputy Hoyt Teasley and U.S. Customs agent David Wilhelm. Nichols has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity.

FOR THE DEFENSE:

DR. MARK CUNNINGHAM, Clinical and forensic psychologist

Home: Lewisville, Texas

Rate: $250 an hour

In almost four days on the stand, Cunningham —- who has a professorial air, wears a salt-and-pepper Van Dyke beard and rimless glasses, and sipped water from a bottle while he testified —- said he spent about 300 hours researching Nichols’ life, interviewing him and others, along with many documents, before determining Nichols was suffering from a delusional compulsion and therefore not guilty by reason of insanity when he killed four people on March 11, 2005. Cunningham said Nichols was driven by this delusional compulsion and believed he was launching a slave revolt. He said Nichols did not know right from wrong, though he did realize he was breaking the law. Nichols viewed himself as a soldier and all the people he killed as enemy combatants.

Quote: “The way that Brian Nichols is looking at the world around him, and himself in relation to that, is so disturbed and so distorted that he thinks he is doing the right thing … He is psychotic.”

Prosecution attack: If Nichols were so delusional it “overmastered” his ability not to commit the crimes, how could Nichols then make decisions, as he did during his spree, not to kill some people, such as officer Grantley White in Barnes’ chambers, and several people whose cars he hijacked that day?

FOR THE PROSECUTION:

DR. ROBERT PHILLIPS, Forensic psychiatrist

Home: Baltimore

Rate: $475 an hour to consult; $575 an hour to testify.

In two days on the stand, Phillips —- who also wore a salt-and-pepper Van Dyke beard —- made his opinion simple: Nichols wasn’t insane when he went on the killing spree. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have “apologized” to police in a confession when he was caught the day after the killings. If Nichols believed his own delusion, there was nothing to apologize for because he wouldn’t have thought he did anything wrong. If he was trying to start a slave revolt —- as he claimed in his confession —- why did he escape, instead of trying to free the other prisoner slaves in the courthouse?

Quote: “If you’re on the [slave ship] Amistad and you want to incite a rebellion of the slaves on that ship, you don’t jump off, go a distance out in the water and yell, ‘Rebel!’ You do it in the presence of the slaves. You do it to mobilize them. That’s how you incite rebellion.”

Defense attack: Dr. Phillips doesn’t get it. Nichols didn’t apologize for his attack. He offered his “condolences” to the families of his victims. Sometimes a soldier spares the lives of others when it’s in his best interests. Nichols may have decided to spare White, for instance, because he knew the sound of a gunshot would alert the courtroom and spoil his mission to kill Judge Barnes.