By Niall Boyle

niall@sligopost.com

A lawyer for a man accused of hacking to death a New York psychotherapist, who has Sligo roots, with a meat cleaver says his client will plead insanity.

40-year-old David Tarloff, is accused of murdering Kathryn Faughey, whose mother hails from Tubbercurry, in her Manhattan office.

Tarloff’s defence lawyer, Bryan Konoski, says a psychiatrist hired to examine the suspect found “very strong grounds” for a defence of insanity.

Mr Konoski’s court papers say Tarloff suffered from paranoid schizophrenia, depression, intrusive delusional thoughts of God and Satan, belief he is the Messiah and other mental disorders.

Tarloff told police he had been in mental institutions at least 20 times.

He is charged with both first- and second-degree murder in the February 12 death of the 56-year-old psychotherapist.

Konoski said “The evidence is clear that he (Tarloff) did it, but the reasons he did it, what was behind it, are so crazy that we believe we have a very strong insanity defense.”

Tarloff also hears God and the devil talk to him, and he hears God respond when he prays, the court papers say.