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  • The Marshall Project

    He’s Living With Severe Mental Illness. Should He Face the Death Penalty?

    A South Dakota case reflects the national debate on whether execution should be banned for the mentally ill.
    by Maurice Chammah Apr 17, 2019 5 minutes

    Aleesha DeKnikker was grocery shopping, her phone set to silent, when the voicemail from her mother, Carol Simon, came in: “Oh, it’s just Mom. Your brother has really lost it, Aleesha.... He’s just having a mental breakdown and he won’t even believe where’s from. He won’t even believe that I gave birth to him…. I don’t know what to do.”

    Six weeks later, Simon was found dead, along with her 7-year-old grandson, Brayden Otto. Her son, Heath Otto, 24, admitted to investigators in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, that he had strangled his mother and nephew with a phone cord and then slit their throats.

    Soon after, Otto was ruled incompetent to stand trial, and he was sent to a state hospital. Doctors hired by his defense lawyers diagnosed him with schizophrenia. The Minnehaha County state’s attorney, Aaron McGowan, told DeKnikker that her brother could face the death penalty. A trial will take

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