‘Spiraling delusions.’ Lawyers present insanity defense for man charged in 2016 killing
The man who confessed to the 2016 killing of a Pine Grove Mills woman was described Thursday by two mental health professionals as someone whose disorders make it difficult for him to separate reality from fiction.
Applied behavior therapist Kimberly Satriale and licensed clinical psychologist Jolie Brams sketched the most complete public portrait yet of Christopher Kowalski, an autistic man they said had tendencies of paranoia and grandiose thoughts.
Kowalski’s lawyers began the first day of their defense aimed at proving their client was so mentally ill he either didn’t know what he was doing or was incapable of obeying the law when he fatally shot Jean Tuggy.
Thomas Egan III and Christopher Mohney are trying to persuade a jury of eight women and four men to find him not guilty by reason of insanity.
Kowalski, 35, has not contested the killing. Pennsylvania prosecutors have described him as a “cold-blooded killer” and a “coward” who shot a “helpless” 60-year-old that lived alone and had a host of medical issues.
Satriale, who has a doctorate in exercise physiology and began treating Kowalski in spring 2020, testified he struggled to make friends. She described it as an “unmitigated failure.” Brams said “not one person” came to one of his birthday parties.
He would often become hyperfocused on certain subjects, Satriale testified, and sometimes was “incapable” of moving off the topic.
Kowalski thought he was viewed as a “Yankee” when he relocated from Pennsylvania to South Carolina after the killing, Satriale testified. She said he watched “ultra kooky” far-right videos on YouTube for hours at a time.
He often thought female receptionists at medical offices were flirting with him and hoped to start a relationship with them, Satriale testified. One nurse told the human resources department she did not want to work with him.
Kowalski was determined to become a tour guide. He would bow when meeting people and dressed in period clothing, Satriale testified. She said he was also fixated on cowboys and wanted to be a gunslinger.
“He would phrase every sentence, ‘If I were Chuck Norris, I would X, Y, Z,’ “ Satriale testified. He despised feminism and viewed himself as a “man’s man,” she said.
Kowalski’s parents, Brams testified, did “everything humanly possible to help their son.” She described them as “incredibly lovely people.”
His disorders often prompted him to isolate himself, Brams testified. She diagnosed him with chronic depression and grandiose delusional disorder.
“He knows that the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania has laws. He knows that when you kill somebody we believe that it is a crime. In certain situations, it is a crime to him,” Brams testified. “But in this situation — in the spiraling delusions that he has — he believes ... that he had to kill somebody to get the manhood and the courage that he needed to fulfill his destiny and make a better world for everybody. That is what he believed. Other murders would be wrong. This one was correct.”
The defense is trying to overcome the prosecution’s case, which featured bloody crime scene photographs and an hourslong confession to investigators.
Senior Deputy Attorney General Kelly Sekula for the first time played additional footage Thursday of Kowalski’s interview with investigators, when he admitted in detail to killing his cat and a rabbit.
Some jurors did not look at the screen as the interview played; others watched with a hand over their mouth.
“I always wanted to be larger than life,” Kowalski told Ferguson Township police detective Caleb Clouse.
The insanity defense is a rarely used strategy that three legal experts said is difficult to use successfully. The defense is raised in less than 1% of felony cases nationwide. Of those limited cases, the defense is successful less than 25% of the time.
Prosecutors are expected to present their rebuttal case Friday. The jury could begin deliberating Monday.