TUCSON — The federal judge overseeing the case involving suspected Tucson shooter Jared Lee Loughner on Thursday denied a request from his lawyers to keep him in Tucson rather than sending him to Missouri for a psychiatric evaluation at a federal penitentiary in Springfield.
Loughner’s lawyers did not object to the exam being conducted, but asked the court to consider how it is handled. They do not want Loughner to be sent to Missouri, away from the assistance of his San Diego legal team. Nor do they want the exam videotaped. They also objected to the examination being conducted by the federal Bureau of Prisons rather than an independent, court-appointed evaluator.
In court documents, they characterized US District Court Judge Larry Burns’ March 21 order as “imposing unprecedented limitations on defense investigation and work product.”
Instead, Loughner’s lawyers said they would petition to have a court-appointed examiner conduct an evaluation at the federal penitentiary in Tucson, where Loughner is currently being held.
The motion may have been a moot point because Loughner’s legal team learned that he was transferred out of state a few hours after they filed the request.
Loughner, 22, has pleaded not guilty to 49 charges including murder, attempted assassination — one of which relates to the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) — and other counts.