A man (38) accused of murdering his mother has been found guilty but insane.
The Central Criminal Court jury took less than one hour to return a unanimous verdict on Kevin Bridgeman, who had pleaded not guilty to murdering Marie Bridgeman (56) near their home at Mill Estate, Ratoath, Co Meath.
The jury heard evidence from three psychiatrists that Bridgeman was suffering from chronic paranoid schizophrenia at the time of the killing in January 2003.
The court heard that Kevin Bridgeman is a chronic paranoid schizophrenic who suffers from delusions and a persecution complex. He sat expressionless with arms folded as the jury returned the verdict and just nodded when Mr Justice Barry White ordered him to be detained at the Government's pleasure in the Central Mental Hospital, Dundrum.
The two-day trial hinged on the central issue of whether he was insane at the time he killed his mother. Three psychiatrists testified that he was in fact insane.
Ms Bridgeman was a well-known Dublin brothel keeper. She was convicted in the Dublin Circuit Criminal Court for running a brothel in Dublin's Wexford Street in 1999, which had been in operation for five years. She had one earlier conviction in 1998 and at the time of her death, was being investigated by the Criminal Assets Bureau.
Dr Mona Kilduff, consultant psychiatrist at St Vincent's Hospital, Fairview, told the jury she began treating the accused from May 2001 after she took over from Dr Brian McCaffery. Dr Kilduff said from his case notes, it was apparent that Kevin Bridgeman had a "long standing history of chronic paranoid schizophrenia" from at least 1992 and maybe since 1990.
He had a history of self harm, was delusional and displayed acute persecutorial symptoms. He believed he was being "followed" and at one stage thought that Lloyds of London were monitoring him. He had been admitted to psychiatric institutions on numerous occasions since the mid-1980s, once for a period of five months.
The court was told that in 1999, he lay down underneath a bus waiting for it to drive over his legs and amputate them. He had delusions about worms in his legs and thought that would get rid of them.
In evidence, Dr Brian McCaffery said in his opinion, the accused was "quite insane" at the time of the killing and would not have known that what he was doing was wrong.
The court heard that Ms Bridgeman died from a combination of brain injury, inhalation of blood, facial fractures and compression of the neck. After the killing the accused went back inside the family home and waited calmly for the gardaí to arrive.
The court heard that the killing happened after an argument when Marie Bridgeman told him to go to bed and turn off the light but he refused. She then told him she was going to see his father and he called her back. He told gardaí she was domineering towards him and "wrecking my head".
Releasing the jury from further service for ten years, Mr Justice White said this was a very tragic case in which the collective view of the professionals involved was that the accused man was legally insane at the time he killed his mother.