Judge orders competency evaluation in Lebanon murder case
New London Superior Court Judge Hillary B. Strackbein ordered a competency evaluation Monday for a Lebanon man accused of fatally stabbing 31-year-old Christian E. Beloin last month.
Alan P. Nadeau, 31, who was charged with murder following the April 12 incident at his father's home at 67 Ledge Road, made his first appearance in the court where major crimes are heard. A thin, dark-haired man in a green prison jumpsuit, Nadeau clutched his midsection during his brief apperance and admitted he did not understand the proceeding. His court-appointed attorney, Kevin C. Barrs, asked the judge to order a competency evaluation, which is expected to take approximately six weeks.
Under state law, a defendant is not competent if he is unable to understand the proceedings against him or to assist in his own defense. If a team of clinicians determines he is not competent, they will indicate whether or not they think he is capable of being restored to competency. Upon his arrest, Nadeau told state police he suffers from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and schizophrenia, and that he has been prescribed antidepressant and antipsychotic medications but had not taken them since last year.
According to a police report, Nadeau stabbed Beloin in the neck as Beloin slept on a couch at the Nadeau home, where the defendant lived with his father and the father's girlfriend. Nadeau entered the lobby of the state police barracks in Colchester with a briefcase shortly after 4:38 a.m., at the same time his father called to report that a man had been stabbed, the report said. Holding his head with his hand, Nadeau stated he had been abused as a child.
Troopers seized the briefcase, which contained a computer and a bayonet with blood on both sides of its 8-inch blade. Nadeau told police he was sitting on the couch with Beloin, a friend of his father who visited the home often, when he started having flashbacks of being abused by his father and Beloin. He said he thought the only way to stop the abuse was to attack the victim and "get locked up," according to the report. He said he went to the basement and retrieved the bayonet out of a toolbox, returned upstairs and stabbed the victim one time.
At the crime scene, troopers found Beloin lying face down on the living room floor with blood pooling around his head and neck and smeared on the walls, according to the police report. A paramedic pronounced him dead at the scene. The state Office of the Chief Medical Examiner determined Beloin died of a stab wound to the neck and ruled the death a homicide.
The father and another man were in court today for Nadeau's appearance.
Nadeau is being held in lieu of $1 million bond at the Garner Correctional Institution, which specializes in housing prisoners with mental health issues.
k.florin@theday.com
Twitter: @KFLORIN
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