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Petition filed for Vietnam veteran with PTSD scheduled for execution
The attorneys of Vietnam War veteran Andrew Brennan have issued a clemency petition to the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles ahead of his Jan. 13 scheduled execution.
Brannan, now 66-years-old, was diagnosed with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in 1984 and Bipolar Disorder in 1996 by the Veterans Administration. After a 1-week trial, Brannon was convicted by the Superior Court of Laurens County, Ga. for one count of malice murder of Deputy Sheriff Kyle Dinkheller. The incident took place during a traffic stop for speeding, according to petition documentation.
The petition, penned by L. Joseph Loveland Jr. and Thomas C. Lundin Jr., states that while there is no question of guilt or innocence, the death penalty should be reconsidered:
“Andrew’s bizarre and violent behavior at the time of the shooting was captured by the camera in Deputy Dinkheller’s vehicle, and that videotape inflamed the prosecution and the jury during the trial. But since the date of the incident in 1998 and trial in 2000, America’s understanding of PTSD and the frightful toll that it can exact on combat veterans has grown exponentially as the result of 14 years of new data from wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Board, unlike the jury that originally made the life or death decision in 2000, has the benefit of this new information in exercising its responsibility to act as our society’s conscience in answering a simple question: Is it right to execute a mentally-ill veteran whose sole incidence of violent behavior is traceable directly and inexorably to mental illness resulting from his combat service?”
The Board will consider the petition case on Jan. 12, according to a press release.
Perspective
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PTSD as a defense in criminal court has gone from being overused to probably being underused. It is not clear to me whether or not the shooting really was PTSD or mania. Certainly, it should have been explored further if he was criminally responsible at the time.
I currently conduct forensic work with the state of Maryland; I see the lawyers often don’t know what to do with these cases of veterans. There is much cynicism about PTSD, and people sometimes don’t want to deal with those cases. They tend to worry that the jury will think it’s hogwash. But they don’t do enough of a job exploring whether or not that will be useful.
The take home from this is that I would urge the psychiatrists to educate attorneys and attorneys to educate themselves, about the possible consequences of veterans exposed to combat who might have PTSD, traumatic brain injury, depression or exposure to toxic agents, to ensure lawyers aren’t missing something that could be very helpful to them.