Killings blamed
on delusions

Micah White says he believes his
mom and aunt were vampires
who were after him

A Kailua man accused of fatally stabbing his mother and aunt, dousing them with gasoline and setting them on fire says he did not mean to hurt them, but believed they were vampires who were out to get him.

From his notebook Excerpts about vampires from Micah White's notebooks: » "Vampires are overconfident in their evil; their only cause is to rid the world of humans." » "They want any humans who know of their existence to believe that they are crazy. This is done through repeated attempts at telepathy of negative energy messages of yin to offset balance of mind." » "My experiences with the vampires have led me to a place of no fear where God protects me." » "They try to establish trust among the living in hopes to betray their trust to gain an easy meal." SOURCE: OLAF GITTER REPORT

The statements by Micah White, 21, accused of first-degree murder for causing the deaths of his mother, Kerry White, and aunt Sharon White in April 2004 are contained in psychological reports from three court-appointed doctors.

"He knowingly and intentionally stabbed, doused with gasoline and set on fire his aunt and mother, but in the psychotic belief that he was destroying evil vampires which threatened his life and the lives of other humans," wrote Olaf Gitter, a psychological consultant.

All three have separately concluded that White was substantially impaired by a mental disorder and either could not differentiate between right and wrong or control his conduct -- the legal test for insanity. The court has not made a decision on their conclusions.

At the request of prosecutors, Circuit Judge Virginia Crandall ordered yesterday that the doctors also examine White for his fitness to go to trial. White is scheduled for trial in August.

Gitter noted that White appeared to be exaggerating the severity of his mental illness, likely to secure a better outcome at trial.

The state has retained its own expert, Dr. Harold Hall, to examine White for mental illness and effects of his past drug use and a 2003 assault in which he lost consciousness.

The panel's reports are the first glimpse into what went wrong on April 5, 2004, at the Whites' Kailua residence.

Deputy Prosecutor Franklin Pacarro Jr. said he could not comment on the panel's findings because the court's decision is pending.

Deputy public defender Susan Arnett, one of two attorneys representing White, said the doctors all found him to be mentally ill and not criminally responsible based on his delusions.

Arnett had indicated earlier that the defense intends to rely on the insanity defense.

Micah White's preoccupation with vampires is documented in his own writings contained in damaged notebooks recovered from the fire. His family also was concerned about his preoccupation, noting that he carried around sharpened sticks and called people vampires.

They suspected White might be on drugs because he would stay up at odd hours of the night and said and did "weird things," including cooking a full-course meal at 3 a.m. But immediate family members never saw him use drugs.

White has admitted to using LSD, hallucinogenic mushrooms, crystal methamphetamine once and experimenting with marijuana, the last time in March 2004.

A week before the attack, White's mother told his sister that she believed White had psychiatric problems and was trying to find a psychiatrist. And the morning of April 5, his father had spoken with White's older brother about what to do with him because White's behavior was becoming strange.

According to the reports, White gave the following accounts of that day to the three psychiatrists:

He began hearing voices inside and outside his head in 2001. The voices called him names or ordered him to do things such as beat up someone. He said he would talk back and refuse to comply. He reported also having visual hallucinations, including bright lights, poltergeists, vampires and ghosts.

The voices and thoughts of fighting vampires intensified in the month before the April 5 attack, White said. He built crosses, stakes, nunchucks and anything wooden that could be used to fight vampires. He noted that a vampire had to be stabbed in the heart, have its head cut off or set on fire, and that garlic and silver do not work.

"I made a choice to fight the vampires at my house or at least try," he later told psychologist Duke Wagner.

He described getting up about 9:30 a.m. April 5 after a bad night's rest. He was supposed to go to work but heard voices telling him not to go because money was going to be stolen, he would be killed, his bicycle would be stolen and he would get fired.

So he stayed home and watched "Queen of the Damned," a vampire movie, on TV. He tried eating some fried rice his mother had prepared but ate little because he thought it was human flesh.

He believed he would get killed either by God or the devil if he did not fight for either of them. "I decided to fight the vampires," he said, and armed himself with a sharpened drumstick.

He told Wagner that when his mother brought his aunt home from a dentist appointment, both women "smelled like decaying flesh" and that he already thought his mother was a vampire.

He told Gitter that he argued with his mother after telling her he had been fired from work, then went to his room. Voices in his head were asking him if he was going to fight back and that "they are stealing your blood," he said.

White said he brought a rock and the drumstick to his brother's room, where his aunt was resting, and struck her in the head twice. "I was afraid she would bite me. I stabbed her with the drumstick twice, going for the heart -- that's how you kill a vampire. She screamed, my mom came in. ... I stabbed her ... back and forth between the two trying to kill the vampires. I wasn't trying to kill my aunt and mom."

With voices telling him to burn them -- like a scene in "Queen of the Damned" -- White said he got some gasoline, poured gas on the two women, set a piece of paper on fire and threw it at his aunt before fleeing out the back door.

In a later interview with Wagner, White said he still believes his mother and aunt were vampires and that he misses them, but, "I still feel I did the right thing."