History of Duane Owen's mental illness, Part III
In light of the litigation pending related to Owen’s mental competency for execution, this series reviews the entire history of evidence and documentation related to Owen’s mental illness.
That is the last line of the trial court’s 1999 sentencing order in which the court sentenced Duane Owen to death for the Slattery murder—not the murder for which Gov. DeSantis issued the death warrant.
This series reviews the entire history of evidence and documentation related to Owen’s mental illness. (The last update on the litigation can be found here.) Part I can be found here. Part II can be found here.
Owen’s execution is currently scheduled for June 15, 2023. The full background of Owen’s case can be found here.
1999 Retrial, continued
Dr. Barry Crown
Dr. Barry Crown testified for the defense at the 1999 retrial for the Slattery murder. Dr. Crown conducted a neuropsychological exam on Owen, which included “administer[ing] a group of neuropsychological tests after taking some general background information.”1
Dr. Crown determined Owen’s IQ to be 85, which he explained “is roughly at the 37th percentile, meaning 63 out of 100 people would get a higher score . . . .”2
Dr. Crown testified that Owen is impaired in the following areas: concentration, attention, and mental flexibility.3
As to Owen’s brain functioning at the time of the crime, Dr. Crown testified:
Trial Court’s Findings
The jury rejected the insanity defense and convicted Owen.
On March 23, 1999, the trial court sentenced Owen to death. The trial court found two relevant statutory mitigating circumstances.4 First, the court found that Owen committed the crime while under the influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance.
Second, the court found Owen’s capacity to appreciate the criminality of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirement of the law was substantially impaired.
In addition, the court found, among other mitigation, that (1) Owen had a mental disturbance and his ability to conform his conduct to the requirements of law was impaired, and (2) Owen suffered from organic brain damage.
2003
According to the Commission’s report dated May 24, 2023, Owen was “downgraded to an S2 (psychopathology requiring counseling) in March 2003 and to an S1 meaning no psychopathology in August 2003.” The reasoning for these reclassifications is unclear.
In its October 2003 decision related to the Slattery murder, the Florida Supreme Court wrote that Owen did not mention mental illness as the reason he committed the crime when questioned in 1984. However, the Court wrote that he had since explained “that he needed a woman's bodily fluids to assist in his transformation from a male to a female.”
As the records reviewed in this series show, this has been Owen’s story the entire time.
2006 Postconviction Evidentiary Hearing
Several experts testified at an evidentiary hearing in 2006 for Owen’s postconviction claims. These transcripts are not available online from what I have found, but one expert’s testimony is in the Record on Appeal for the currently pending case at the Florida Supreme Court.
Dr. Henry Dee
Dr. Henry Dee was asked “do a neuropsychological assessment to see if there was any evidence of neuropsychological impairment.”5 He conducted a battery of testing on Owen as part of his examination; here are the results to which Dr. Dee testified:
Dr. Dee testified that the brain damage could affect Owen’s behavior. He also testified that Owen began to “drink at a relatively early age . . . . He said that his drug use began with beer at ten or eleven.”6 Then at the VFW home, “they got pints of Bacardi or cherry vodka.”7 His drug use then expanded:
Dr. Dee testified that the drugs Owen was using “would intensify” delusions. He testified that Owen had significant neuropsychological impairment.
My thoughts are with everyone involved in the warrant and execution process.
ROA at 798.
ROA at 803.
ROA at 804.
Owen v. State, 862 So. 2d 687, 690 (Fla. 2003).
ROA at 849. He
ROA at 854.
ROA at 855.