Said Vision ‘Told’ Him to Kill Mother : Crest Man Sentenced to Mental Hospital

A Crest man who a jury determined was insane when he killed his elderly mother at what he said was the urging of TV evangelist Jerry Falwell was committed Friday to a state mental hospital.

Ashley Demers, 26, was found innocent by reason of insanity June 6 after San Diego Superior Court jurors heard testimony by three psychiatrists who said he was insane when he struck Anna Demers, 67, over the head with a 7-pound rock on their Crest property Nov. 10, 1988.

Judge Norbert Ehrenfreund committed Demers to Patton State Hospital in San Bernardino, where Demers probably will stay for life unless he can later prove in court that he has regained his sanity.

Attorneys said it is unlikely Demers would be able to show that he was no longer insane. He was diagnosed as having hallucinations, delusions and suffering from schizophrenia.

Bill Boyland, Demers’ attorney, told the judge that he wanted the court to note that Demers himself did not feel he was insane.

After his arrest Jan. 2 when he showed sheriff’s deputies where he had buried the body of his mother, Demers told police that a shadowy figure whom he believed was Falwell ordered him to kill the woman because her body had been possessed by demons and turned into a corn husk.

Anna Demers used to watch the fundamentalist preacher regularly and was quite religious herself, psychiatrists said.

The sentencing Friday was delayed several hours when deputy marshals could not locate Demers.

He had fallen asleep under a bench in a holding tank in the courthouse, but deputies could not find him and had begun searches within all of the county jails for him.

In an earlier proceeding, the same jury convicted Demers of first-degree murder in the case, but the insanity finding prevents him from serving any time in state prison.

The prosecutor did not present any witnesses to contradict the defense testimony that Demers was insane. One psychiatrist who regularly testifies for the prosecution became a defense witness and agreed that Demers was insane.