Page 3 - Flat Affect News Today

Using second-degree murder what about the fact the attorney says he was flagged to her mental state. you heard her father talk about how she was in and out of some mental hospital, flagged because she had no emotion when she was told that she killed four people. >> yeah. quite frankly any of us that have been prosecutors or in law enforcement weve dealt with what we call edps, emotionally disturbed people, that typically quite honestly is one of those responses that flat affect. again, i think t...

Exhilarating. there were moments of terror, you know, it ran its course. >> why would it be terrifying? >> oh, i was still in denial that i even did it at times. >> youre seeing this happening. >> well, im trying to also remember what came after as far as -- >> right. im watching. youre seeing this event happening and youre reliving this, right? trying to figure out. >> yeah. i can play back the videotape. >> of course, you can. almost 20 years later. >> yeah. i have no doubt you can play it bac...

The man who killed kevin rice. >> vincent holmes, he was a street kid. late teens. he was friends with william buck, hung out at the auburn manor apartment complex. really had a flat affect, borderline functioning intellectually. just a street kid with really no purpose in life. >> not surprisingly, when holmes was questioned, he pointed the finger at william buck. this created a problem. could forensics prove who pulled the trigger? several residents at the auburn manor apartments saw william b...

Would have seriously altered his mental state. >> i dont even recall it. i was a zombie mentally. i was no telling where. >> juries look at defendants. they look at their eyes, they look at the way that they respond to evidence that comes in. i believe the flat affect, which really was caused by these drugs, certainly led the jury to believe that earnest willis was a cold-blooded killer. coming up, will ernest willis win his freedom after 17 years on death row? the evidence says yes. but will ...

Murder. he implicated his friend, 19-year-old vincent holmes, as the man who killed kevin rice. >> vincent holmes was a street kid, late teens. he was friends with william buck, hung out at the auburn manor apartment complex. really had a flat affect, borderline functioning intellectually. just a street kid with really no purpose in life. >> not surprisingly, when holmes was questioned, he pointed the finger at william buck. this created a problem. could forensics prove who pulled the trigger? s...

>> youre not going to go speak with them? >> i dont have anything to say. >> now, aside from the thoughts of maybe he was building a legal case or legal defense, listen -- he was just involved in an altercation, listen how calm he seems talking in the middle of all this. does that say anything to you, jeff? >> absolutely. here were looking at a person who is in such a state earlier, allegedly breaking things, threatening another individual. now all of a sudden hes so calm. we call that flat affe...

He had a flat affect, blah, blah, blah. so i mean, those kinds of things to me are sensational. they arent really evidence. i think the devastating thing for the defense they really have to kind of handle and somehow mute is the fact that the daughters are there in court thinking that their father is a murderer. that is -- if youre the defense lawyer, to me that is the single worst fact i have to deal with. because thats the perception that those jurors are going to have. those jurors are going ...

He had a flat affect, blah, blah, blah. so i mean, those kinds of things to me are sensational. they arent really evidence. i think the devastating thing for the defense they really have to kind of handle and somehow mute is the fact that the daughters are there in court thinking that their father is a murderer. that is -- if youre the defense lawyer, to me that is the single worst fact i have to deal with. because thats the perception that those jurors are going to have. those jurors are going ...

My opinion as far as what was going on, what he was in the middle of. it just seemed ta something was going on with him. >> would you call that sort of in generic terms a flat affect as to what was happening? >> generic terms, yes. >> okay. >> did that cause you concern that he had, in fact gone through a traumatic event and his response was a flat affect about itting? >> yes, it did. >> do you make anything of that, danny? people react in different ways to stress and being in the middle of i gu...

>> he appeared to be lacking in my opinion as far as what was going on, what he was in the middle of. it just seemed that something was going on with him. >> would you call that sort of in generic terms a flat affect as to what was happening? >> generic terms, yes. >> okay. >> did that cause you concern that he had, in fact gone through a traumatic event and his response was a flat affect about it? >> to some point, yes, it did. >> do you make anything of that, danny? people react in different w...