Psychologist charged with beating sleeping daughter with baseball bat

May 17, 2011

Note from Psychcrime.org: It is imperative  that the police and other authorities start looking into the medicine cabinets of people who commit senseless acts of violence such as school shootings, inexplicable murder-suicides and, yes...bludgeoning your own ***sleeping*** daughter with an aluminum baseball bat. 

A judge ordered a psychologist accused of beating his 20-year-old daughter with a baseball bat to be examined to see if he’s competent to stand trial.

Oxford resident Robert Brian Kelly, 52, is charged with one count of assault with intent to murder. His daughter, who was asleep at the time of the incident, remains hospitalized in critical but stable condition following the incident last week.

During a hearing Tuesday before 52-3 District Court Judge Lisa Asadoorian, Kelly’s attorney, James Galen, Jr. asked that his client be examined at the state’s Center for Forensic Psychiatry. He said his client has not been sleeping, has had a pain in the back of his head and is experiencing hallucinations.

Galen also said Kelly has two master’s degrees, has worked as a psychologist in private practice for 25 years and is currently on suicide watch in the Oakland County Jail.

“Something I believe is either mentally or physically wrong with my client. ... I’m absolutely convinced that there’s something wrong with him,” Galen told the judge.

Asadoorian granted Galen’s request and ordered Kelly to be examined. She set a subsequent hearing for July 29.

Outside the courtroom, Galen said his client said he blacked out at the time of the incident at his house on Glaspie Street in Oxford.

"He has no recollection until he came to, with an aluminum baseball bat in his hand, and saw his daughter bludgeoned," Galen said.

Source: Ann Zaniewski, "Psychologist accused of bludgeoning daughter to have mental health exam," Daily Tribune,  May 17, 2011.