For the third time, a judge has committed a 75-year-old South Bay woman to a state mental hospital after finding she was mentally incompetent to stand trial for killing her elderly roommate in 2010.
Maria Moore will go back to Patton State Hospital where she has lived before after similar rulings by other judges. Hospital officials will give her medication and she will be returned for trial if she regains her mental competency.
Moore has said repeatedly she is mentally competent to stand trial for the Dec. 6, 2010, slaying of Charmian Therese Antaramian, 83, who was beaten to death in her Citrus Avenue home in the Palm City area. Moore often gives outbursts in court, sometimes claiming her attorney is part of a conspiracy.
After two stays at Patton, a judge determined in a trial last year that she was competent. Moore had a preliminary hearing in Chula Vista Superior Court and was ordered to stand trial for murder on Feb. 13.
In July, her attorney told a judge he doubted she was mentally fit, and criminal proceedings were suspended until another judge committed her to Patton. She has been in custody since a police officer found Antaramian’s body in her bathroom. Moore was found at a neighbor’s home, trying to get money for bus fare out of town. She has pleaded not guilty.
