A teenage boy cut up an apple at the kitchen table, told his mother he loved her then walked around to the back of her chair, hugged her and then slit her throat.
That is how mentally ill teen Gabriel Gaudi Lang killed his mother Joan Hendry in their White Gum Valley home on December 15, 2014.
West Australian Supreme Court Justice Stephen Hall has granted a three-day trail without a jury to begin in June, and has said while the facts of the murder were not in dispute, the issue at trial would be if Lang – 19 at the time – was of sound mind at the time.
It is believed earlier that night Ms Hendry had taken her son to Fremantle for a mental health assessment, however they left about three hours later without receiving medical advice, reports the ABC.
After attacking his mother with the same knife used to cut the apple, Mr Lang, 20, also attacked his sister, trying to stab her in the neck. Ms Hendry’s partner Bruce Abbott also suffered cuts to his hands as he wrestled the knife from Lang.
Since his arrest, Lang has reportedly been treated with a variety of antipsychotic and mood stabilising medications, with Justice Hall remarking the accused has “likely been developing a serious mental illness, namely schizophrenia, over approximately the last three years” which may have contributed to his “impaired judgement”.
According to the judge, the case would require “careful consideration of detailed psychiatric evidence”, and it was in the interests of justice for the trial to be determined by a judge, not a jury, as they may not be able to contextualise the violence and legal principles.
Mr Lang is currently being held in a secure unit at Graylands psychiatric hospital awaiting his trail in June.
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