A Carroll County man accused of stabbing his mother to death has pleaded not criminally responsible.
Eric Raymond Yates, 39, was set to go to trial next week on charges of stabbing his mother up to 30 times with a 9-inch knife, but Carroll Circuit Judge Michael Galloway allowed the case to be postponed so the defendant can undergo a psychiatric evaluation, according to the judge?s order filed Thursday.
Yates, according to his plea, says he is “not criminally responsible by reason that at the time of the commission of the offenses alleged, the defendant suffered from a mental disorder and/or mental retardationand lacked substantial capacity to either appreciate the criminality of their conduct or to conform their conduct to the requirements of the law.”
Prosecutors did not object to postponing the trial for the psychiatric evaluation.
Allan Culver, senior assistant state?s attorney, said in court filings that he has blood evidence that would take until mid-July to analyze.
Yates, who had worked as a pizza delivery-man, had confessed to the slaying last November, days after authorities found him lying on a bench at 11 p.m. outside a public library in Westminster and arrested him, police said. He had a gash on his hand and blood-soaked pants, but he is now pleading not guilty.
He was living with his mother, Christine Windstein, 57, in her trailer in the unit block of East Mayer Drive at the time of the incident and became a suspect when neighbors said they had not seen him in several days, police said.
According to court records, he has a history of domestic violence and driving while intoxicated offenses.
Yates is charge with first- and second-degree murder, and first- and second-degree assault.
The case is one of two homicides that took place in Carroll last year.
