Insanity Defense in Court-Martial of Airman Hinted

Attorneys for an Air Force clerk accused of attempting to give classified information to the Soviet Union said Tuesday their client has a “deeply disturbed mind” and urged that the government hire a private psychiatrist to help prepare an insanity defense.

Capt. G. David Miller, assistant defense counsel for 25-year-old Airman Bruce D. Ott, made the motion as Ott’s court-martial began in a hot, cramped courtroom at this Air Force facility 40 miles north of Sacramento.

Air Force Lt. Col. Howard P. Sweeney delayed a decision on the motion. Sweeney referred a second defense motion, to suppress evidence, to the U.S. District Court in Sacramento.

Ott’s attorneys, without providing details, said they wanted information about “the procedures leading to the acquisition of certain prosecution evidence, and if appropriate, suppression of that evidence.”

Sweeney, presiding at the court-martial, postponed further proceedings for several days to review the documents.

Miller said Ott had been examined by Dr. Albert Globus, a Sacramento psychiatrist, and that Globus had tentatively concluded that Ott suffers from a “deeply disturbed mind with highly compulsive tendencies and unrealistic thinking.”

Ott’s parents hired the psychiatrist and paid him a $1,000 retainer, Miller said. But the defense counsel said the parents did not have enough money to pay for the additional 10 to 12 hours of testing that Globus needs to complete a sanity evaluation. He urged Sweeney to order the government to pay Globus’ $95-an-hour fee, contending that the psychiatrist was essential to the defense’s case.

The chief prosecutor, Maj. Charles H. Wilcox II, opposing Globus’ hiring, called for a sanity hearing to be conducted by the Air Force. Miller said the defense would not object to a sanity board as long as the government agreed to hire Globus.