A Mexican-American man from Wisconsin who suffered from paranoid delusions and schizophrenia was committed to a mental health institution for life by a judge after being found responsible for driving directly into a white motorcyclist he did not know because he believed all white people were trying to kill him, the Associated Press reports.
In July 2020, 27-year-old Daniel Navarro drove his vehicle head-on into a motorcycle driven by Phillip Thiessen, a retired investigator for the Wisconsin Department of Justice and a former police officer, killing him. Navarro had had no previous contact with Thiessen and doesn’t appear to have known him.
Upon apprehension, Navarro told police that his white coworkers and neighbors were all plotting to kill him by poisoning and drugging him, and that he lived hearing constant racial slurs from the white people around him.
Navarro pleaded not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect, and a jury accepted that plea after hearing testimony from two doctors Thursday that Navarro indeed suffered from schizophrenia and experienced paranoid delusions because his mental illness was untreated.
“An innocent man is dead,” Navarro’s attorney, Jeffrey William Jensen said. “And if [Navarro] had gotten help maybe he wouldn’t have ruined his life.”