Slouched over in the striped gray shirt that he has worn for much of his murder trial, his piercing stare disconcertingly fixed at the courtroom walls at times, David Tarloff can appear like one of the few killers whose claim to an insanity defense might be deserved.
In the last three weeks, jurors have heard a long recitation of Mr. Tarloff’s psychiatric problems. Throughout his adult life, Mr. Tarloff, 45, has been prescribed antipsychotic medication to alleviate delusions and hallucinations. He has received a diagnosis of schizophrenia and been hospitalized against his will numerous times. And three months after one such commitment, Mr. Tarloff entered an Upper East Side medical office on Feb. 12, 2008, and killed Kathryn Faughey, a psychologist, with a mallet and a knife.
Yet a lifetime of mental illness hardly makes an insanity defense a sure thing. Mr. Tarloff’s lawyers must convince jurors, who began deliberations Wednesday, that he was so sick that day that he did not understand the consequences of his actions: that pounding and stabbing Dr. Faughey could kill her, or that the attack was wrong.
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