St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Schizophrenic can be forced to take anti-psychotics---may face federal death penalty

A schizophrenic from near Valmeyer, Ill., who is charged with murdering 2 U.S. Capitol police officers in 1998 lost his last bid Monday to avoid anti-psychotic drugs that could make him fit for trial.

The U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear a challenge from the suspect, Russell E. Weston Jr., 44. He had appealed 2 lower-court rulings to medicate him against his will.

Federal Public Defender A.J. Kramer had argued that Weston's Fifth Amendment rights to a fair trial would be compromised by returning him to a mentally healthy state that was absent when he burst into the Capitol on July 24, 1998.

Kramer acknowledged Monday that the fight had ended and that his client would be forcibly medicated - "I'm sure fairly soon." He declined to comment further.

Weston, 44, has been declared mentally unfit to stand trial. The hope of federal prosecutors and the friends and families of the victims - Jacob Chestnut, 58, and John Gibson, 42 - is clear. They want Weston well enough to go to trial.

The suspect's father, Russell Weston Sr., didn't seem surprised: "What can I say? You just have to go along with what they say, that's all."

Before the shootings, Weston's family had urged the troubled man to stay on his medication to control his schizophrenia. But Weston grew frustrated at the trembling that was part of the drugs' side effects and stopped taking his medication.

After the Capitol rampage, when a prison doctor decided that Weston's mental state precluded him from standing trial, the family backed his refusal of medication. Their fear: if he became mentally well enough to stand trial, he could face the death penalty. Attorney General John Ashcroft has the final say on whether to seek the death penalty. The senior Weston last visited his son in May at a federal prison hospital in Butner, N.C. The father said Monday that he now believed the death penalty is unlikely. "He's mentally ill," the senior Weston said. "There's no doubt about that."

Monday's decision left intact a ruling in July by the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. That court found that the forcible medication was good for Weston - and for the government's purpose of bringing a murder suspect to trial.

The appeals court adopted the prosecutors' argument that the anti-psychotic drugs were "medically appropriate."

Despite their victory Monday, federal prosecutors in Weston's case said their goal of bringing him to trial for murder remained distant.

"We're very far away from that," one source said on the condition of anonymity. "He's got to be restored to competency, and then he'll be brought back to appear before the court. His lawyers then have the option of challenging that determination. It's just too early to tell."

A similar case is pending in St. Louis before the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. That case involves Dr. Charles "Tom" Sell, a dentist from Town and Country. The govenment wants to medicate him so he can stand trial on charges of Medicaid fraud and conspiracy to commit murder.

Sell has been at the U.S. Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Mo., since 1999.