Local News in Brief : Competency Hearing Ordered for Trupp

Nathan N. Trupp will be given a court hearing to determine whether he is mentally competent to stand trial on charges he killed two security guards in Universal City, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge ruled Thursday.

Judge David S. Milton ordered the hearing at the arraignment of Trupp, 42, who told police he killed the Universal Studios guards Dec. 1 after they refused to let him see actor Michael Landon. Police said Trupp, a former mental patient, killed three people in Albuquerque, N.M., two days earlier.

Milton ordered a psychiatric evaluation of Trupp and suspended his arraignment until after the hearing, which is scheduled to begin Jan. 10.

Trupp’s attorney, Deputy Public Defender Steve Hobson, told Milton in court Thursday that Trupp is mentally ill and unable to help with his defense. Deputy Dist. Atty. Sterling E. Norris did not object to the order granting the competency hearing.

“After reviewing all of the facts of the case . . . we have come to the conclusion he is not competent,” Hobson said. “He is irrational most of the time.”