A man on trial for bludgeoning four men to death with a metal bar as they slept on the New York streets had been diagnosed with schizophrenia when he left jail months earlier and was hearing voices telling him he needed to kill 40 people or he would die too, his lawyer told jurors on Tuesday.
Randy Santos, 31, is asserting an insanity defence at his trial in state court in Manhattan. Through his lawyers, he has acknowledged committing the 2019 Chinatown rampage. But, they argued, he was not criminally responsible because mental illness has polluted his mind with irrational thoughts and left him prone to violence.
If they succeed, Santos could be sent to a psychiatric treatment facility instead of prison.
“He needed the voices to stop. he needed to save his own life,” Santos’ lawyer, Marnie Zien, said in an opening statement. “He saw no other way out.”
Santos, 31, has pleaded not guilty to charges including first-degree murder in the deaths of Florencio Moran, Nazario Vasquez Villegas, Anthony Manson and
Chuen Kok and attempted murder charges for assaults that left two other men severely injured. They were among 319 killings in the city in 2019, including 52 in Manhattan.
Reports at the time said Kok, 83, was an immigrant from Hong Kong. Fellow New Yorkers described him as a kind, quiet and gentle man.