Defendant Wants Jurors to Decide His Sanity : Crimes: Accused of stabbing his 18-year-old girlfriend to death, Christopher Rowland, 22, says his lawyer and prosecutors want him sent to a mental hospital.

In an unusual hearing Thursday in Van Nuys Superior Court, a murder defendant who described himself as a fallen angel who has spoken to Jesus complained to jurors that his lawyer has joined with prosecutors and the judge in trying to lock him away in a mental hospital.

Christopher Michael Rowland, 22, insisted to the court that he is mentally competent to stand trial on a charge that he stabbed 18-year-old Roberta Rosentheim to death in a Van Nuys motel eight days after meeting her.

Rowland disputed the argument of his attorney, Deputy Public Defender William M. Thornbury, that he is too mentally unstable to assist in his defense.

“I want to proceed to trial as speedily as possible and get this over with,” Rowland told jurors, who are expected to begin deliberations today over whether Rowland is competent to stand trial.

“All it is, is an attempt by the D.A. to get their case together. I’m fully competent and fully aware of the details of this case.”

But later, Rowland told jurors: “If I can put it very briefly, I’m a fallen angel. . . . I believe I spoke to Jesus three times. . . . A voice said, ‘Be a warrior for me and you’ll have all you desire.’ ”

Rosentheim fell in love with Rowland, a drifter, after being introduced to him by her brother, who brought Rowland home after meeting him on a bus, family members said.

She was killed Feb. 12 in a room at the Chateau Motel on Sepulveda Boulevard, where the couple had gone because Rosentheim’s family disapproved of the relationship.

If the jury finds Rowland incompetent, he may be housed in a state mental hospital until psychiatrists determine that he is able to stand trial.

Claims of mental incompetency in trials are usually determined by a judge after reviewing statements by psychiatrists who have examined the defendant, prosecutors said.

But Rowland took the unusual step of asserting his right to have jurors decide the matter, saying they were the best witnesses to his behavior.

Rowland appeared composed and articulate during most of an hourlong statement in which he accused the Los Angeles public defender’s office of dragging its heels in its investigation of the killing. He said the office was trying to make him appear insane because he had accused it of wrongdoing, and he wanted a new lawyer.

The public defender’s office, Rowland said, wants “to have it on the record that I’m insane or I have organic brain damage, to cover up these allegations I made” so “the whole case would be shelved.”

Thornbury, in questioning his client, said his office had begun an investigation into the killing in June.

Rowland said he was unaware of the investigation and had not been interviewed by the office.

A psychiatrist testified Thursday that Rowland suffers from paranoid schizophrenia and major depression.

A second psychiatrist said Rowland’s mental troubles may be related to long-term drug abuse.

Rowland, however, said he appeared psychotic when interviewed by the psychiatrists because he was taking Thorazine and Stelazine, which are anti-psychotic drugs.

“I was so heavily and thoroughly medicated, I was a zombie,” he said.