Allen Stanford Faking Memory Loss To Avoid Trial

Prosecution lawyers are asking a federal judge to rule that former billionaire and financier Allen Stanford has regained competence and can now stand trial.

Stanford, now 61, was indicted back in 2009 for allegedly defrauding investors of over US$7 billion in a scheme based largely on certificates of deposit issued by a Bank owned by Stanford on the Caribbean island of Antigua.

In January of this year Stanford was found by a federal Judge to be of diminished mental capacity and unable to assist in his own defence. This was after the court heard testimonies by three psychiatrists, including one hired by the government, that Stanford was taking heavy doses of anti-anxiety and anti-depressant drugs.

According to court filings by the prosecutors, the Bureau of Prisons Federal Medical Centre in Butner, North Carolina, last month concluded that Stanford is now competent to stand trial. The medical centre evaluated him for eight months and concluded that hedoes not suffer from a mental illness which would interfere with his ability to understand the nature and consequences of the proceedings against him or to assist properly in his defence . The full report was filed under seal.

Following the competency hearing in January, medications which had been prescribed to Stanford, after he was severely injured in a 2009 altercation with a fellow inmate at a detention centre in Conroe, were reduced. Medical experts had said that the medications were over-prescribed and hindering his cognitive function. Though the reduction was successful in improving his cognitive function, the government's court filings said, Stanford is now claiming to have complete memory loss of all events prior to the assault.

The government says that Stanford isfakingthe amnesia and that, on several occasions, including a May 2010 court hearing in a related civil case, he has demonstrated he remembers events prior to the assault. Neurological testing also showed no basis for memory loss, the filing said, and that the type of amnesia claimed by Stanford is arare phenomenon.

A proposed order submitted to the court, by Stanford's attorneys said that he suffered atraumatic brain injury due to the assaultand that the cocktail of medications administered by the Federal Department of Corrections exacerbated the condition. Stanford'smental condition has not so improved as to permit the proceedings to go forward,the proposed order said. Doctors retained by the defence concluded that Stanford is still incompetent to stand trial.

On December 20th, in a Houston Court, District Judge David Hittner will hear arguments from both sides on Stanford's competency. He would then be asked to decide whether or not Stanford is fit to stand trial in January next year.