Hilbun Jury Told Signs Pointed to Insanity

He talked about recreating the human race when the world ended, told his sister that Howard Stern was sending him secret messages over the radio and alarmed those around him with his mood swings.

These were some of the “sign posts” showing Mark Richard Hilbun was overtaken by mental illness and in “another world” when he raced across Orange County on a two-day rampage in 1993, killing his mother, fatally shooting a friend at the Dana Point post office, and attempting to kidnap a female co-worker he had been stalking, his lawyer said Monday.

“He thought he was a messenger of God,” Deputy Public Defender Denise Gragg told jurors, who must decide if Hilbun was legally insane at the time of the crimes. “He thought he was saving the world.”

Deputy Dist. Atty. Christopher Evans accused the 42-year-old former postal worker of manipulating his mental problems to receive a “get out of jail free card.”

“He knew he was stabbing. He knew he was shooting,” Evans said. “He knew it was wrong when he did it.”

Hilbun has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to charges that could lead to a death sentence if jurors decide he was legally sane. If jurors find he was insane, he would be sent to a state psychiatric hospital, where he would remain until it is determined he has regained his sanity.

A psychiatrist for the defense testified Monday that Hilbun suffers from a disorder that includes manic depression and schizophrenia.

Dr. Ernest Klatte said records show Hilbun was suffering from depression as early as 1980 during a stint in the U.S. Air Force, and may have been counseled as a child.

His problems appeared to intensify in January 1992, when he decided he wanted a relationship and became obsessed with fellow postal worker Kim Springer, Klatte testified.

Despite hospitalization and being repeatedly told to stay away from Springer, Hilbun deluded himself into thinking the woman loved him, what Klatte described as a “gross distortion of reality.”

The defense has contended throughout the trial that Hilbun was driven May 6, 1993, by a desire to take Springer by kayak to Baja California, where he believed they would live as Adam and Eve when the world ended. Hilbun told police he killed his mother in her Corona del Mar home to spare her from the apocalypse.

Hilbun is receiving antipsychotic medication from jail doctors, which keeps his disorder in control, Gragg told jurors. But his prognosis of recovery is extremely poor, she said.

The prosecutor contended the psychiatric evidence will show Hilbun is capable of knowing right from wrong despite his problems.

Evans has contended Hilbun carefully plotted to kidnap Springer, and also wanted to “pay back” postal officials for trying to fire him. Hilbun killed his mother because she was an obstacle to his plan, the prosecutor has said.

The same jury that will decide the sanity issue found Hilbun guilty of first-degree murder last week for repeatedly stabbing his 63-year-old mother, Frances Nell Hilbun, and for shooting to death postal worker Charles Barbagallo, 42.

Jurors also found him guilty of seven counts of attempted murder and other felonies stemming from the rampage at the post office and robberies in Dana Point, Newport Beach and Fountain Valley.