Earlier Court Date Scheduled for Molester william ayres

Surprise!

There is a hearing with the topic of "Further Proceedings" now scheduled for September 7, 2012 at 8:45am.

Huh... How about that, suddenly time is of essence for child molester william ayres. 

I'll monitor the situation, and update the calendar accordingly.

[8/29/2016 Wednesday Update]: Re-verified date with court schedule. No change.

FishWrapper Roundup: ayres case piques reporter interest

Image Courtesy blog pal Patient Advocate

Fish Wrapper Roundup:

Hearings in the last couple of weeks have finally piqued the interest of the news reporters. Everyone is allegedly shocked about the revelation that william hamilton ayres, accused of molesting many young boys, has been using his psychiatric training and knowledge to fake dementia in order to avoid criminal trial. Prosecutor McKowan's statement that ayres was "perpetrating a hoax" made all of the reporters perk up their ears.

Unfortunately, because they have not been following the case thoroughly and consistently, even the most hard-hitting reports lack the depth necessary to pursue the deeper questions that could reveal some of what's going on behind the scenes; why this has taken so long, where the inconsistencies are in the prosecution side of the story -- and indeed, even that there are inconsistencies.

Here's the overview of recent news articles:

I'll briefly critique the articles pointing out quality of content, errors, omissions, and where deeper digging could have been done within context of the article.

San Francisco Examiner 2012-08-08 (Mike Aldax) (pdf):

The article is a fairly good article for the limited coverage. It's worth a read if you just want to confirm what we'd already printed here from an outside, non-biased source.

Of note: The Examiner is the only paper which has consistently presented the correct jury count results from the criminal trial that ended in mis-trial way back in July 2009.

Also of note: The article quotes this blog. The quotes were lifted without contacting blog authors, and without providing adequate source credit. The source is listed as "a commenter wrote on a blog dedicated to the case." A comment was posted to the article requesting that they add the source link, but the comment was not allowed. email was also sent to the author and paper editors, but no response has been provided. The paper has been put on notice that we now reserve the right to use their content without source if desired, as this appears to be their policy.

Errors: The article states:"Only days before his competency hearing last year, a private investigator filmed Ayres" This is not correct information. The investigator filmed ayres AFTER the competency TRIAL, and BEFORE the DA conceded that ayres was incompetent, rather than pursuing re-trial. If' you're going to rely on the blog for information without verifying content from the authors, please AT LEAST read the blog carefully.



San Mateo County Times (Mercury News) 2012-08-09 (Joshua Melvin) (pdf)

I tepidly recommend this article for a read. Melvin has been doing an ok job with breadth of coverage, but not depth where there are important issues.

Minor note: Melvin doesn't appear to know what the jury vote count was during the criminal trial, and consistently prints some variation of "The jury voted 11-1 for conviction on at least one count."

Dig a little: In the article Melvin says ""He also worked extensively for San Mateo County's juvenile justice division and the board of supervisors in 2002 honored him for his lifetime of achievement in "improving the lives of children." But Melvin just leaves the statement dangling, to show his "tumble from notoriety" but he doesn't dig into the obvious implications: with so much County, Court and local politician reputational risk tied to ayres, why aren't officials taking steps assure the public that they are making every effort in spite of the risk. What about the errors that the prosecutor has admitted were made? Why wasn't the DA more involved? Was it BECAUSE of the reputational risk?


San Carlos Patch 2012-08-08 (pdf):

In general, I like these "Patch" articles. Although they aren't always hard-hitting, they do take an independent view from the other large conglomerate regurgitation machines, so sometimes they strike some important information. This particular article is not especially meaty. It's a fair overview.


San Mateo Daily Journal 2012-08-09 (Michelle Durand) (pdf):

I definitely recommend reading this article. Durand is somewhat scattershot. Sometimes she has some good depth of reporting, but then other times seems to accept information without further questioning. This article is a good read, and has some court dialog included that is of import. She was clearly paying attention in court, and trying to put the puzzle pieces together. If only she had been attending all of the hearings and listening to what we've been saying, she might have put some of the bigger issues at the forefront by now...

Minor note: Durand has also never consistently reported the jury vote count for the criminal trial, and resorts to "jury hung in varying amounts on every count." This is not strictly accurate, of course.

Of Note: Durand reports:"If Ayres is again found incompetent for trial, he will be transferred back to Napa State Hospital. If instead Grandsaert rules Ayres competent, the once-renowned former doctor will be retried on several counts of child molestation between 1988 and 1996." I think that in THEORY this is correct, but it would be good if she CONFIRM with all parties that this is EXACTLY what WILL happen. I think that in this case "he COULD be transferred back to Napa" and he "MIGHT be retried" are more precise language, unless she has actually confirmed intent with the DA. This is actually a KEY point that she should resolve.

Personal Point: Durand quotes McKowan as stating : "The public and victims’ also have a right to due process" and McDougall as stating: "... it is not the same. They’re not sitting there with their freedoms deprived” I hope that McDougall and his family never have to go through what child molestation victims go through. I'd gladly sit in jail for a couple of months if I could get rid of the mess that I have to deal with. I'm positive other adult victims would agree. McDougall needs to put the brakes on his impropriety if he ever wants any human respect.


San Francisco Chronicle (SFGate) 2012-08-03 (Henry K. Lee) (pdf)

Overview with some procedural detail. Hit or miss.

Of Note: Lee makes the statement "Guidotti acknowledged that there had long been suspicions as to whether Ayres was pretending to have dementia and memory loss." But he doesn't clarify if Guidotti meant that the DA had "long been suspicions" or if she means that some of the victims and their families have long been suspicious. This is a fairly important point that should have been clarified, because Guidotti, DA Wagstaffe, and prosecutor McKowan have NEVER expressed suspicions that ayres was pretending to have dementia... in fact exactly the opposite. (More on this in the Daily Post review below....)



(Palo Alto) Daily Post 2012-08-08 (Jamie Morrow) (pdf)

The paper is print only, but I've attached an acrobat version in case you didn't buy the paper. (You are now on your honor to go buy a copy of a future issue.)

This is a strong recommend for a read. It includes some quotes from several interested parties, including the DA and McKowan. Morrow actually went out of her way to come up to speed on the case, and actually interview the prosecution, although there are some points that could have been more deeply pursued if there had been a longer-term following of the case.

Some general commentary on quotes attributed to McKowan:
According to Morrow, McKowan said that ayres' "time at Napa was the first time people had been able to observe him in a nonforensic interview situation." My question is: Why is this so? We have been telling the prosecution about seeing him in stores and driving around without his walker since the criminal trial, and we provided the investigator's report to them before they conceded incompetency. Surely they would have saved county funds by hiring a person to tail him for a bit for observation. Had they done this EARLY during his bail release, they may have even attained record of further questionable behavior.

Further, Morrow reports that McKowan said: "a jury hung 8-4 over whether he was competent to aid in his own defense, with eight members saying he wasn’t. That jived with all the doctors who said he wasn’t" McKowan follows with: "I heard the court’s own experts say he was at best borderline competent” I was at the competency trial. This is not what the court appointed, non-biased doctors that McKowan called as witnesses said. They stated that ayres is competent. As did several of child molester william ayres' own medical test results. (Read here.) Had Morrow been fully up to speed on the prior competency trial, she could have asked this important follow-on question.

Last, but far from least, Morrow reports that McKowan states the following about the Private Investigator's video and report provided to the prosecution prior to conceding that ayres was not competent: “Without hearing the conversation, it had no ability to persuade anyone [...] The only evidence of what he was saying was the report of this paid investigator.[...] It was nothing that would have had any hope of persuading a jury"

Here are some important points:
1) Audio can't be recorded in California without consent from ALL parties, or a warrant.

2) a licensed PI report is admissible as evidence.

3) McKowan does NOT know that the "paid" report would not have persuaded a jury in a competency re-trial, as a jury was CLEARLY persuaded by the PAID testimony of the defense witnesses in the matter during the competency trial.

4) McKowan has made assumptions about what the jury would believe before, and was proven wrong, and she should have learned from this. During the criminal trial, she insisted that bringing medical professionals who went through the same training as ayres would not be relevant to swaying jury perception about ayres' "medical examinations," but a juror told the Mercury News on 2011-10-26 that "there was no doubt Ayres' exams were fishy, but unanimously deciding they were sexually motivated was too much. More experts, or someone to talk about Ayres' clinical background, would have helped."


I wish that Morrow had had this background going into the interview, because I think she would have been the one to dig deeper.



On the whole then,

I really wish these reporters had been following the story more closely, it would have allowed them to better identify inconsistencies in the story being told by the County, leading to more probing questions.

One point that really drives this home is the following observation made in the almanacnews.com "TownSquare Forum"(pdf) by Michael G. Stogner, local victims rights advocate, and political aspirant (emphasis mine):

Court Watching observation, Something has changed here, this was just a bail hearing where normally very few people attend or are interested because it is solved fast. Yesterday I couldn't help but notice that there were 5 reporters, Chief Deputy Karen Guidotti was there and we had an extra judge there who I believe to be Hon. Judge Craig L. Parsons. After Hon Judge John L. Grandsaert heard both sides, he took a 10 minute recess to make his ruling. He was joined in chambers or it looked like he was joined in chambers by our other judge, they both came back after 10 minutes and he made the ruling of bail denied.

NO supervision from the DA's office has EVER been present during hearings or trials for ayres, as best as we can tell.

Something has indeed changed! And because the press has not had continuity in this very significant case, none of the press noticed this change, and none of the press questioned why there is this change.

Robert Andre Kimmich: dead ayres supporter

Heartless Coward: Deleted November 7, 2011
Buh bye, now. Satan will enjoy your services in Hell.

We recently received a comment from an astute reader who noted that Robert Andre Kimmich, a San Francisco head-shrinker had died last year (pdf).

Kimmich, who allegedly had an epic career in head-shrinkery, and had done lots of fantastic shrinky things for the local community, also had a major and insurmountable character flaw: He was an adamant supporter of child molester william hamilton ayres.

Kimmich was a co-signator of a letter pleading for cash for ayres to fight the charges against him during the criminal trial. The letter went out to the psychiatric community at large. Note that the obit mentions that Kimmich and "Dr." Mel Blaustein worked together on Golden Gate Bridge suicide issues. Blaustein was yet another sycophant head-shrinker who signed the ayres letter pleading for cash. Maybe these two assholes could have served society better by not contributing to the additional, ongoing psychiatric harm that ayres' victims suffer by stuffing a sock in their putrid pie-holes.

Further, Kimmich was one of the two "very good friends" of child molester ayres who was videotaped lunching with ayres just before the San Mateo County DA conceded that ayres was not competent to defend himself against criminal molestation charges. Topics of discussion included how useful it is to talk about Alzheimer's in front of your attorney.

Much like the Sandusky / Paterno case: reputation seems to be the key issue in cases like this, once the evil gets under your skin, it's hard to get rid of it without admitting failure and guilt. Rather than risking a reputational hit, weak people refuse to see the evil.

Apparently, Kimmich took the evil to his grave with him, bringing a pale blush to any good that he might have done.

Shame on you Kimmich, and good riddance.

Jonathan McDougall Shafts Child Molester ayres!

Shyster attorney for william hamilton ayres, who has been charged with molesting many young boys while alleging to provide them with psychiatric care, has finally shanked the ball deep into the rough.

While arguing for ayres' release last week after a 9 month stay at Napa State Hospital, where ayres has been malingering; lying to the people of San Mateo County about his mental health, Jonathan McDougall was trying to buy YET MORE time for his client by claiming that he couldn't possibly be ready for a competency hearing by September 10th.

Thinking he was going to snake yet more time for his client to be out-and-about in San Mateo County, McDougall managed to get the judge to put the hearing off until October 1, with the caveat that he would probably have to delay EVEN FURTHER because of other pending trials.

This, IN SPITE of the the fact that the judge had already indicated that he was not inclined to set bail at all until after a competency hearing, AND that he was not inclined to force the County to incur more costs for ayres' Country-Club lifestyle at Napa State, where he wasn't accepting treatment anyway.

Instead, What Shyster McDougall got for his client was nearly an extra month in County Jail, while we wait for the competency hearing that McDougall himself got delayed!

From what I understand, life in PRISON is better than life in County lockup. This is GREAT news, even if short lived.

I'm betting that in the next weeks, we're going to be hearing plenty of motions from McDougall to try to break him out of jail early.

Wonder if suddenly, he's going to have all of his "research" done and calendar cleared by September 10.

And finally, a warm thank-you to Jonathan McDougall for letting us see your child molester be cuffed for just a bit longer.

For all of my faithful asshat lawyer readers out there: Yes, I know... If I'm ever falsely accused, I'll be eating my words, constitutional rights, blah, blah, blah...

But it really doesn't matter because in addition to being shysters, you're also whores.

If you take on a child molester for Ca$h, and can live with paying for your kid's college with blood money, you'll just as readily take ca$h from someone who calls you a shyster whore.

BAIL DENIED

Just in: Ayres has been denied bail for now... Judge Grandsaert ( who needs to watch his step) said he can't rule on the issue of bail until the issue of competency is resolved.

 Ayres is not going back to Napa.

He will remain in jail.

Next hearing: October 1, 2012.

Wonder if any of Ayres' former victims are currently being housed at the Redwood City Jail? Wouldn't be at all surprising.

Bail Hearing Reminder

Hearing Reminder:
August 8, 2012 11am


The hearing on Wednesday is the continued bail hearing, and bail, release, or otherwise should be determined at the hearing. NOTE: The hearing time is at 11 AM. 

william hamilton ayres, who has been charged with molesting many young boys under the guise of providing psychiatric treatment, and who has been avoiding prosecution by claiming that he is demented, and does not have the capacity to defend himself against charges, has been declared to be competent by a team of evaluating doctors at the Napa State facility.

One Year Ago: DA Steve Wagstaffe to Mother of a Victim: We Need Evidence of Ayres Driving a Car

What the Papers Aren't Reporting: the All Over the Map Stories Coming Out of DA Steve Wagstaffe's Office Concerning Ayres' Mental Competency since 2011.

Plus:  Exclusive information on what San Mateo District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe said about Ayres' mental competency one year ago that no reporter ever bothered to publish: "It would have been more helpful if Ayres had been seen driving a car." 

Backstory: 

Immediately following the mistrial for mental competency of Ayres in June 2011, San Mateo prosecutor Melissa Mckowan  told a number of parents of Ayres victims that Ayres was NOT competent; that his dementia was rapidly advancing; that she would NOT retry Ayres and that (direct quote) "no jury would ever find Ayres competent to stand trial." She also stated that she would NOT send Ayres to Napa as "he would not get better there."

However, that same summer, a medical colleague of Ayres tipped off the familes of victims that Ayres WAS competent, and had been seen by other medical colleagues in San Francisco at restaurants, holding forth and acting lucidly on all sorts of topics. She said that everyone could see he was competent.

Additionally, a friend of an Ayres victim who committed suicide last August learned from his employer, who is married to a psychiatrist who works at Ayres' old office complex, that psychiatrists there had seen Ayres driving a car to the complex. The wife of the psychiatrist said that Ayres would then hang around the breezeway of the office complex, lurking about his old office, the scene of the crimes. The wife of the psychiatrist told the friend of the Ayres victim that other psychiatrists were "creeped out" by Ayres hanging around the building.  She said that Ayres would then get into his car and drive away.

These tips of sightings of Ayres driving and acting competent were turned over to the police department in the summer of 2011. They were never acted on. The County did not put Ayres under surveillance.

Because the County would not act on the tips that he was competent, and the prosecutor was insisting he would never be competent to stand trial, in a last ditch effort, a group of parents and victims pooled their own money and hired a private investigator to tail Ayres just a week before the hearing where the DA was going to state that they would not retry Ayres in August 2011.

As readers of this blog know, the team of three investigators tailed Ayres to a restaurant in San Francisco, where Ayres lunched with his wife and two medical colleagues.

Although Ayres' lawyer had stated in the trial that Ayres had very little memory of the past and had trouble comprehending events in the present and future, the three investigators heard Ayres talk about his business ventures, his former patients, the Iowa straw polls, the future of the Republican party, and that he had a court hearing in a few days. He also joked, to the merriment of his luncheon colleagues, about how one benefit of Alzheimer's is that you could use "it in the courtroom" for one's own benefit.

But when the lawyer for one of the victim's families contacted prosecutor Melissa Mckowan on Friday August 19th, 2011 and told her he had evidence that Ayres was competent, Mckowan stated, "I don't believe it. Ayres has dementia. He is mentally imcompetent to stand trial. He will never be competent to stand trial. I am NOT retrying him."

The prosecutor said she didn't even want to  look at the video surveillance and then stopped returning the lawyer's calls. The lawyer for the victim's family then frantically tried to call DA Steve Wagstaffe. Finally, after considerable effort, he managed to speak to Wagstaffe about the surveillance video. Wagstaffe agreed to see the video.

Then, utter, dead silence from the San Mateo DA's office on this matter for the next 24 hours. Calls from reporters who had seen the video to Wagstaffe were, very uncharacteristically ( Wagstaffe is famous for returning every reporter's calls) unreturned. 

Bear in mind that just two days earlier, DA Steve Wagstaffe had told San Mateo Supervisor Dave Pine that he gave him his "word that retrying Ayres was a strong option and still on the table."  That was BEFORE Wagstaffe had seen the surveillance video that showed Ayres acting competent.

Then, 24 hours after the San Mateo DA had received the surveillance video, at a time when Wagstaffe was refusing to return reporter's calls, a mother of an Ayres victim finally got him on the phone late in the afternoon on Saturday, August 20, 2011.


Her description of her conversation with Wagstaffe on Ayres' mental competency and the video is described in an email here. Names  of the sender and receiver have been redacted for reasons of privacy. But this is the email verbatim.

From:      xxxxxxx
Subject:   Re: Media Contact
Date:       August 20, 2011 6:06:12 PM EDT
To:   xxxxx

I called Wagstaffe today and got a return call about 10 muinutes later. He talks faster than a machine gun, and I will try to relate here everything of importance.

He said that he looked at the videos and read the transcript, and that the overwhelming, dramatic evidence we needed was a video tape of Ayres driving a car. He would have gone back and retried him for that. He also mentioned seeing him without a walker would have helped.

He was very disturbed about McKowan telling people that Ayres would never go to Napa. He said he never knew that, and if that's the case it's a serious violation. He said that sadly, justice had not been served in the initial trial and mentioned that if the 11-1 count had been overturned, Ayres would have gone to prison for the rest of his life. He also said that delays weakened the trial, and Melissa was very frustrated after the trial.

We talked about re-trial, and he said because of the 8-4 verdict on the competency trial, he could not justify a repeat since he has an obligation to the taxpayers against spending more money on a subsequent trial that can't be won.

Here is the official plan for Monday: The DA's office will argue for committment to Napa State Hospital, and only Napa.

➲ Ayres' medical colleagues last year said Ayres was competent.

➲ The surveillance video showed he was competent.

➲ The court appointed, unbiased doctors who testified at Ayres' competency trial said Ayres was competent.

➲ Now according to Napa reports, even the custodial staff could see that Ayres was mentally competent.

Why is it that Wagstaffe's office couldn't see that he was competent? Or, did Wagstaffe know he was competent but just couldn't be bothered to retry him?

I would be interested to hear how much it has cost San Mateo County to house Ayres at Napa for the nine months versus the cost of a mental competency retrial that Wagstaffe said a year ago "couldn't be won."

Just to give readers a comparison of how other DA's offices around the country stack up in convicting pedophiles - all of whom were arrested AFTER AYRES.

Jerry Sandusky case in Pennsylvania. Length of time from arrest to conviction: 7 months.

Dr. Scott and Dr. Mark Blankenburg, pedophile pediatricians in Ohio: Length of time from arrest to conviction on 79 counts of child molestation, possession of child pornography and bribery: 9 months.

Dr. Earl Bradley, pedophile pediatrician in Delaware in one of the largest cases of child abuse in the history of the US. Length of time from arrest to conviction of molesting more than 100 children: 9 months.

Dr. William Ayres case: Arrested in April, 2007. More than five and a half years ago. NO CONVICTION.




Please also read the new post immediately below this one for more detailed coverage of the August 3rd, 2012 hearing than you're going to see anywhere in the paper.

william ayres: Lying, Malingering Child Molester

More detail about today's hearing in the matter of the Lying, Malingering, child molesting, william hamilton ayres:

Today, August 3, 2012 william ayres was in the courtroom for his hearing about the report issued by the Napa State Hospital on his mental condition.

In brief: The report indicates that william ayres has been malingering; feigning his dementia in order to avoid prosecution for molesting young boys.

Everyone is shocked and surprised! The defense is shocked at the report! The DA's office is shocked at the report! And the press is ESPECIALLY shocked at the report! It's Goddamned Shocking!!

NONE OF THESE people should have been shocked!  The shock is all a bunch of bullshit.

PRIOR to the point that the DA conceded that ayres was not competent, and tucked him away at Napa, families and friends of the victims of ayres had a private investigator's report to find out what ayres was up to. They filmed ayres having lunch with shrink pals Larry Lurie and Robert Kimmich of San Francisco. Lurie has written papers on Alzheimer's and its symptoms. At lunch, they discussed Alzheimer's and the advantage of talking about it in front of your lawyer... everyone had a jolly laugh.

The reports were provided to the DA, and the defense, and the court, as well as the press.  Days later, the DA conceded that ayres is demented. Everyone rolled their eyes at our claims that ayres was faking.

Including the press.


In the Court today:

Judge Grandsaert presided over the hearing. Grandsaert was also the judge who heard the competency trial, and who was enraged that the Private Investigator's report was provided to the court.

Solveig and Barbara were present, along with a granola-flake older hippie chick and some guy with a stupid hat and a cane (maybe HE's pretending to be blind...) the child molester was also present. The press seems to want to paint a picture that he's falling apart and unkempt, and frail. His hair was neatly trimmed, his beard was neatly trimmed. He's thin, but not gaunt. He used to be a fatty, now he's a healthy weight. Yes, his hair is white, and slightly balding.  Lockup has done him some good. (And apparently has cost you taxpayers WAY more than it would have to put him on trial again to begin with.)

The hearing opened with the judge summing up the defense attorney's motion to release ayres on his own recognizance, and motion to seal the report,  Prosecutor McKowan agreed with sealing the Napa report, and asked for the original bail amount to be re-instated.

The judge chided the loser defense attorney  McDougal because, in contesting the certification of competence, he asked for jury trial. The judge clarified that it was a court hearing, not a jury trial, according to the 1372 statues. McDougall  acted contrite, and said that's what he really meant. He also wanted a later hearing date in the November timeframe;  September 10th was the judge’s preferred date.

McDougall claims that he will need to testify at the hearing, as the report apparently contains  information about statements that he made to doctors, which he alleges are “categorically incorrect.” He states that he has subpoenas out for 14 people related to the report.  He claims that this preparation, and review by another attorney of transcripts and statements in the report will necessitate a longer delay before start of the hearing.

McDougall says he needs another attorney because: “As much as I’d like to, I can’t see myself avoiding taking the witness stand”  He also whined about needing all of the paperwork from Napa State.

McKowan clarified: She's already talked to doctors, and has been assured that all documents are ready to be sent on moment’s notice,  so the hearing  date should be expedited. She says that McDougall’s other attorney doesn’t need to be fully briefed on case, but only the specific areas relating to statements attributed to McDougall in the report.

Grandsaert reminded McDougall that he was the judge at the competency trial… there is not as much need to “gild the lily” (*wow *-- Just wow...)  as there would be with another judge.  He also states that McDougall is VERY well briefed on the case.

McDougall would not agree to a September 10th hearing. He whined more about the new information that he'd have to review:  “Clearly this new report is in complete contradiction to ALL the other testimony that this court heard." He made the implication that the report was not valid, because it was based on this “one doctor’s findings” countering all of the other doctors.

After McDougall objected to Sept 10th date, Judge had a long pause.

Then he hemmed and hawed, basically asking if McDougall was really, really sure.  There are other trials soon after that  McDougall has to “resolve” first, possibly causing even greater delay.

McKowan said she’d make effort to continue two October trials if necessary to make whatever date gets picked, but that she’s ready for the September 10 date, as are all of the doctors who need to testify.

Judge dissembles for a bit, then set the 1372 Competency Hearing for October 1st, 9am, expected to last 7 court days. He appeared to be really struggling, but ultimately caved to the defense requirements.

Next up were bail discussions:
The judge states that 1372 calls for bail hearing upon court’s approval of the competency certification, as there is not going to be an approval due to McDougal contesting the certification, and so bail is not necessary until the hearing is completed. He seems to have put McDougall in his place, then asks McDougall for his arguement, and instructs him to keep the requirements of the 1372 statue in mind.

McDougall: (pregnant pause) then:  "I.. I...I.. I..  guess your honor, I haven’t seen case law,…. " [blah, blah, blah] McDougall does a really lousy job of coming up with lawyer-speak when he's under the gun.   

The judge reminds McDougall  to keep in mind that the statute assumes that in most cases there won’t be an objection by the defense, and the court will immediately accept the certification, and proceed to criminal proceedings.  (And therefore set bail immediately.)

McDougall claims that he wants ayres to return to Napa “for continuing treatment”.  If they won’t impose bail.  McDougall makes lots of arguments about how the child molester ayres is not a flight risk or danger to society.

The judge then expressed concerned that return to Napa will cause more of the same kinds of things that ended up in the report, resulting in YET MORE need for additional discovery and more delay. He was looking for some kind of indication from  McDougall that further continuance  would not happen; McDougall pinky promised that continuance would not happen FOR THAT REASON.

McKowan then objected to the idea of ayres' return to Napa. According to 1372 (e)  a patient is allowed to return to the facility IF treatment needs to continue to maintain competency.  McKowan says that this is  specifically addressed by Napa doctor McIlnay:

She states that the report says “There is no chance that he is going to degrade.”  It states that he’s malingering and that therefore there has been NO TREATMENT since he’s been there. “There is NOTHING  that he was doing at Napa” that he can’t do in Jail; there is nothing in 1372 that allows for return to treatment if it's not needed; It will be very expensive to the county to keep him there.

She goes on, stating that it's not possible to determine if ayres is a flight risk,  He’s been able to “carry out this big elaborate hoax” to fool doctors during their examination, all the while displaying normal behavior while not under examination. She states that the report says that it's obvious to people who are not involved in his evaluation, but who see him all day, every day;  He can’t be trusted.

She then stated that "We haven’t had opportunity to observe his behavior while out of custody" and she says that at Napa, lay people were watching him.  She calls the report "compelling" and states that nursing staff and custodial staff are cited in the report describing incidents that made them believe that ayres is "perpetrating a hoax."

McDougall spends a great deal of time pleading with the court to set  "reasonable" bail.

Another long pause from judge Grandsaert.

He claims that he was not prepared to set any bail until after the hearing,  based on his understanding of the statute.  But then he decided that he wanted to hear more from both sides.


There will be a bail hearing on August 8th at 11am. 
Briefs are due from attorneys on August 6th.

The Napa State report was sealed, but with the caveat that as the hearing nears, the report may be unsealed.

NOTE: My understanding at the time was that ayres would return to Napa, during which time the original court appointed doctors would have the opportunity to do follow up interviews with ayres , But the press is reporting that ayres is to remain in jail until the 8th, at which point the court will decide to either release ayres,  set bail or jail,  or send him to Napa until the competency hearing.

The prosecution asked for the court appointed doctors George Wilkenson and Paul Good be allowed to re-interview ayres , in light of the new report, so that they can be up to speed for the hearing.  Predictably, McDougall objected, and said that 5th amendment and other issues apply. He objected to “DA experts”  having access to ayres.  McKowan clarified: these are not DA experts... they are COURT experts.  McDougal said that he would refuse access without a court order. So Grandsaert issued the order that they be allowed access. Finally, we see someone stand up to McDougall's shyster tactics, if only for this one small thing.



In the Press:

The press has been looking at the blog frequently today. We've had the Mercury News visit,  The San Mateo Daily Journal, The San Francisco Chronicle, The San Francisco Examiner.

They all look here, but they're afraid to speak of us. They're afraid to believe the truth that we tell them, and instead they listen to what the DA is telling them. They report things like: "Guidotti acknowledged that there had long been suspicions as to whether Ayres was pretending to have dementia and memory loss." Guidotti and Wagstaffe and McKowan all believed that ayres is not competent, and they all reported this position to the parents AND TO THE PRESS!

This revisionist history is being bought hook, line, and sinker, but the press rolls their eyes when we tried to tell them that this is just a game to ayres, and that the DA is lackluster in prosecution because the cost of judicial review of all of the juvenile cases sent to ayres by the court and the county over the decades would be STAGGERING. Better to just let it quietly fade away.

I'm not getting my hopes up that the press will suddenly wake up... reporting is a dying art.


For Discussion:


In the hearing today, McKowan stated that no one has had the opportunity to "observe" ayres while he was claiming dementia.. he's been out on bail, and while he was successfully performing his act during the interviews with doctors, he was free to let his guard down while he was out and about. She claims that the pressure of being under constant watch while at Napa was what finally gave him away.

Why didn't they put him under surveillance then, when we told them that we'd seen him around town, when they were given copies of the Private Investigator's report? They worry about county money being spent housing him at Napa State, and that the cost of re-trial in the competency matter would be daunting, but they could have prevented all of that if they had sent someone to watch him for awhile.

Some press about the matter:

Mercury News (pdf)
San Francisco Chronicle (pdf)
San Mateo Daily Journal (pdf)


Back-story:

On April 5th, 2007, the San Mateo Police showed up at the house of the former president of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (an organization which is obviously a complete sham) william hamilton ayres, with a warrant for his arrest and dragged him out in handcuffs. The charges relate to his molestation of many young boys over the course of his career, in which he alleges to have been a psychiatrist. He has been accused of using that practice to gain easy access to young boys from both his private practice, and from the juvenile justice system. ayres was contracted to evaluate young children sent to him by judges in the juvenile system: ayres was the LOW BIDDER on these contracts according to one of the judges in the juvenile system, ensuring the coward a steady stream of boys who were not likely to be believed if they DID ever decide to report, even knowing the severe (and often frightening) legal and peer problems that reporting could cause them.

Malingering Child Molester william ayres

william hamilton ayres, who molested many young boys while they were under his alleged psychiatric care and who has been deceiving the court with a competency gambit to avoid retrial for his heinous crimes, had a hearing today, covering the certification from Napa State Hospital that he IS indeed competent to defend himself in court, and to set bail.

At the hearing today, The Napa State report remained sealed, but the prosecutor was able to reveal more about the content of the report. According to the prosecution, ayres NEVER DID accept any treatment, and therefore was not "cured" by anything Napa did. Further, the report indicates that ayres was decidedly NOT acting as though he had dementia, and it was so apparent that laypeople, Nurses and Janitorial staff, all recognized that ayres was not suffering dementia. The report says that ayres is malingering.

The prosecutor called ayres' actions an elaborate two-year hoax. She indicated that even people at the county jail recognized that ayres was not suffering dementia.

However: bail was not set, and ayres will be returned to Napa State until decision can be made about bail. There will be another bail hearing next week on August 8th, at 11am.

The defense attorney argued that ayres has been free all this time, and is not a flight risk. Prosecution argued that in light of ayres' elaborate hoax, we don't know what his state of mind is. The judge wants to hear more.

The defense contested the certification, and so a hearing will be required. This will not be a jury trial, but instead will be a hearing to last about 7 court days, in front of the judge who heard matters today, and who presided over the competency trial.

More to follow later.

[Update: 2012/08/03-11am PST]: There is an article in the Mercury News (pdf) now, with similar detail.

REMINDER: HEARING TODAY

Hearing TODAY:
August 3, 2012 8:45am


There will be a fairly significant hearing TODAY, Friday, August 3rd, 2012:

william hamilton ayres, who has been charged with molesting many young boys under the guise of providing psychiatric treatment, and who has been avoiding prosecution by claiming that he is demented, and does not have the capacity to defend himself against charges, has been declared to be competent by a team of evaluating doctors at the Napa State facility.

The hearing on Friday will allow the opportunity for the defense to YET AGAIN challenge the finding that he is indeed competent to face charges, and also to set bail, as he has been given until Friday to clear out of lockup at Napa State, and is therefore back in custody of the court.

It remains to be seen if ayres will be released without bail and  if the DA will pursue the matter if ayres continues to claim that he is incompetent.

Also of note: There was a report that was sealed by request of the defense that accompanied the certification of competency. That report may detail WHY the doctors were able to cure his dementia in spite of his refusal to participate in any treatment. Perhaps ayres decided to take his medication after all, and got better, or perhaps they found another cause for his alleged dementia...

Or perhaps they simply state that he was never demented to begin with.

We may hear answers to these questions on Friday.

Reminder: Upcoming william ayres child molestation Hearing

Hearing Reminder:
August 3, 2012 8:45am


There will be a fairly significant hearing on Friday, August 3rd, 2012:

william hamilton ayres, who has been charged with molesting many young boys under the guise of providing psychiatric treatment, and who has been avoiding prosecution by claiming that he is demented, and does not have the capacity to defend himself against charges, has been declared to be competent by a team of evaluating doctors at the Napa State facility.

The hearing on Friday will allow the opportunity for the defense to YET AGAIN challenge the finding that he is indeed competent to face charges, and also to set bail, as he has been given until Friday to clear out of lockup at Napa State, and is therefore back in custody of the court.

It remains to be seen if ayres will be released without bail and  if the DA will pursue the matter if ayres continues to claim that he is incompetent.

Also of note: There was a report that was sealed by request of the defense that accompanied the certification of competency. That report may detail WHY the doctors were able to cure his dementia in spite of his refusal to participate in any treatment. Perhaps ayres decided to take his medication after all, and got better, or perhaps they found another cause for his alleged dementia...

Or perhaps they simply state that he was never demented to begin with.

We may hear answers to these questions on Friday.