A consultant psychiatrist, who has said that a father accused of the murder of his 20-month-old son was not insane, did not interview the man's wife or family and did not speak to any of the doctors who had treated him around the time of the killing, it emerged yesterday.
Mr Yusif Ali Abdi (30), a refugee from Somalia, with an address at The Elms, College Road, Clane, Co Kildare, has pleaded not guilty to a charge of the murder of his son, Nathan Baraka Andrew Ali, on April 17th, 2001, in the apartment at College Road, Clane.
Two consultant psychiatrists called by the defence have told the trial they believe Mr Abdi was schizophrenic at the time of the killing.
But a consultant psychiatrist at the Central Mental Hospital, Dr Damien Mohan, has disputed their diagnosis and said that in his opinion Mr Abdi was not legally insane. Dr Mohan said he did not agree with the diagnosis that the accused was psychotic because it was based largely on what he called "self-reporting", or an over-reliance on Mr Abdi's own accounts of events.
Dr Mohan said that he would prefer to see "independent, verifiable and observable evidence" of psychotic symptoms. But defence lawyer Mr Tom O'Connell SC put it to him that he had not spoken to any of the professionals who might have provided that independent verification.
It also emerged in cross-examination yesterday that Dr Mohan did not speak to the accused man's wife, Ms Amanda Bailey, who has given evidence that supports Mr Abdi's account of suffering hallucinations and acting strangely prior to the killing.
Dr Mohan told Mr O'Connell that he did not have access to clinical notes from the Mater Hospital psychiatric unit. Mr Abdi was referred there in 1999 and was seen four times as an outpatient.
In a clinical note dated February 25th, 1999, a registrar in the psychiatric unit noted that Mr Abdi "complained of hearing voices inside his head". The note also referred to "flashbacks".
Dr Mohan accepted that the note was evidence that Mr Abdi had reported hearing voices to doctors prior to the killing. In his evidence for the prosecution, he had told the jury that Mr Ali Abdi had not said anything about hearing voices until he was remanded in custody for the killing in April 2001. But cross-examined yesterday, Dr Mohan said he "attached less significance" to the Mater record because "it was self-reported and was not independently verifiable". He agreed that he did not ask to see the Mater notes. He agreed he was relying solely on a letter in May 2001 from the head of the Mater's psychiatric unit stating that Mr Abdi had some features of post-traumatic stress disorder with a sleep disturbance but was not depressed and showed no evidence of psychosis.
Dr Mohan disputed the suggestion that he was wrong to allege that Mr Abdi had falsely claimed that he was prescribed anti-depressant drugs in the Mater. Dr Mohan said the drug prescribed was not an anti-depressant at that dosage, but he accepted that the drug was marketed as an anti-depressant and its leaflet stated it was an anti-depressant.
Cross-examined on defence evidence that the accused man had been prescribed the anti-malaria drug Lariam in the months prior to the killing, Dr Mohan said he could not say whether it was the key factor in the case. But he said: "Clearly, it needs to be taken into consideration, with what we now know about Lariam and the potential side effect of an adverse neuro-psychiatric psychosis".
Closing speeches for the defence and the prosecution begin today.