Mother Fights off Psychotic Psychiatrist...Caught on tape

[Janq]

As reported by ABCNews.com:

Brave Mother Fights off Psychotic Psychiatrist
The Entire Unprovoked Attack Was Caught on Tape



By CHRIS FRANCESCANI and LAURA E. DAVIS
July 26, 2007

Manhattan's famed district attorney's office — the model for "Law & Order" — is fighting to keep a "dangerously mentally ill" psychiatrist locked up, after he admitted to attacking a 2-year-old boy and then choking his terrified mother unconscious, according to a spokeswoman for the district attorney.

The attack was caught by a surveillance camera and prosecutors this week used a PowerPoint presentation of images from the assault to bolster their case.

"We are arguing that [the attacker] is dangerously mentally ill and needs to be in a secure facility," Barbara Thompson, spokeswoman for veteran Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau, told ABC News' Law & Justice Unit.

William Johns III, a bipolar Florida psychiatrist who has a history of alcohol problems and violence, admitted in court papers that he drove to New York last summer to escape evil "forces" that he believed were chasing him, Thompson said.

In testimony Wednesday, a friend of the psychiatrist reportedly told a judge that Johns said he had to go to New York to "get out of 'The Truman Show'" — a reference to a 1998 Jim Carrey movie in which the lead character doesn't realize that he's the star of a wildly popular television show and that his friends and neighbors are all actors in the show.

The child's mother, Jil Novenski of Manhattan, testified this week and described how she fought for her life as Johns choked her unconscious.

Novenski told a Manhattan judge that her son Thorin was playing with his plastic bicycle on an afternoon in July 2006, when Johns inexplicably grabbed the child. As Novenski tried to intervene, Johns turned on her.

"I begged, I begged, I begged," Novenski, in tears, testified in a Manhattan courtroom, according to the New York Post. Thompson confirmed the paper's account of the testimony to ABC News Wednesday.

"I screamed, 'Oh God! Please no! I thought for sure he was going to kill me in front of my son," Novenski told the judge. "I wanted to make sure that if I was going to die, he wasn't going to get [Thorin]," Novenski testified. "He squeezed harder and harder, and then everything went black."

Two passers-by pulled Johns off the unconscious mother. Johns pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity in the spring, acknowledging the attack.

"I tightened my grip on her when the two guys came over because I thought they might try to pull me off of her," Johns admitted, according to court papers reviewed by the Post and confirmed by Thompson.

Wednesday, a lawyer for Johns reportedly told a judge that the psychiatrist had been stable since September and that he should be released or transferred to a nonsecure facility in his home state in Florida. The attorney could not immediately be reached for comment.

Johns' family was in court Wednesday, supporting him.

The story can be found at; http://abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/story?id=3416296&page=1
Stills of the videotaped attack; http://abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/popup?i...Index=1&page=1

- Janq

Side note: A lot of good video cameras did for this woman, just like in the UK.
As well notice as indicated in the pic slideshow that the first passerby who saw the attack going on did not get herself involved to rescue the woman and her child immediately and directly. Instead she went to go get somebody else to help her. Meanwhile in that time the mom is ultimately choked out. Had the attacker chosen to do so he could very easily have simply killed her a number of ways, or then chosen to grab her kid and run off in any number of directions....all before any help might have arrived. Oh, and where was 911? Yep. Nowhere to be found because they are not and cannot be everywhere nor do they simply pop up in an instant as soon as trouble occurs, like people seem to think. Also I bet this woman had a cell phone with her but a lot of good that does when you are attacked without much in the way of warning and find yourself in the thick of hand to hand combat with your attacker(s).

[DefensiveCarry.com]

[randytulsa2]

He'd be dead out here in sticks of Hick-Land....

[packinnova]

He'd be dead out here in sticks of Hick-Land....

[Packman73]

I was watching the stills and I noticed the young lady just walk right around the struggle and on with her business...

[peacefuljeffrey]

Well, what do we expect of passersby? They live in a city, in a culture, that forbids them to be equipped for self-defense, and ingrains in them the "knowledge" that the thing to do is let the police handle crimes. Why would any one of them get involved in defending a victim of a violent attack? It should come as no surprise to the officials there that their people will not help one another: they've essentially been taught not to, and on top of that, been stripped of the tools that are useful for doing so.

I notice that the victim herself thought that the thing to do was to "beg, beg, beg." What an idiot. If a guy is violently attacking you, what makes you think that BEGGING will make him suddenly not want to harm you? Ever thought of FIGHTING? I mean kicking, scratching, punching, biting, ANYTHING to give physical resistance? No. You're a New Yorker. You've been taught how to be good and helpless. Reason with attackers. Surely they have compassion in them somewhere...

[SIGguy229]

Wednesday, a lawyer for Johns reportedly told a judge that the psychiatrist had been stable since September and that he should be released or transferred to a nonsecure facility in his home state in Florida. The attorney could not immediately be reached for comment.

Hmmm....no guns in NYC....Guns in FL....

What are the chances this psycho will try this again? and what is the likelihood a CCW will intervene and give this guy a permanent lobotomy?

Castle doctrine?

Yeah--send him to FL....

[falcon1]

Isn't the official position of the AMA that it is opposed to firearms ownership for self defense? Gee, I bet this particular physician loves that stance....

[Sig229]

Jeez, first the Astronaut, then a well educated psychiatrist . Next thing you know a Senator like a Kennedy will kill a young woman and drown her in his car.

But seriously, another reason common people in NYC should be allowed to CC. This nut job could have killed her.

[retsupt99]

[Derrin33]

It still kills me that the three men seem to b asking him to stop. I agree with Randy, being a fellow Oklahoman. Why would you not take action? I just couldn't ask someone to stop killing someone. Don't make sense