Psychiatrist: Teen thought he was shooting ghosts

A child psychiatrist testified today that a 13-year-old Colorado Springs boy thought he was shooting at shadowy ghosts in his house on the morning that he killed his brother and wounded their mom.

Dr. John Hardy, a Pueblo psychiatrist said in his opinion Daniel Gudino, now 14, had been sleepwalking during the attacks. Hardy said he believes the youngster suffered from parasomnia, citing another sleepwalking incident about two years ago.

A Stanford University sleep disorder website defines that parasomnia as “disorders that intrude into the sleep process and create disruptive sleep-related events.”

Hardy was called as a defense witness during the fourth day of a week-long hearing to determine whether Gudino should be tried as an adult or a juvenile. Prosecutors are seeking to charge him with second-degree murder and attempted murder in adult court.

Hardy testified that he does not believe Gudino had the sufficient criminal intent to support the charges because the boy was sleepwalking. He interviewed the boy twice since the May 18, 2009, shootings at the family’s home at 1837 Chapel Hills Drive. He also viewed a police interview with Gudino as well as other medical reports.

“If somebody is in a narcoleptic sleepwalking mode – as rare as that might be – they’re not conscious, even though they can do some fairly complex behavior,” Hardy said.

Prosecutors contend that Gudino acted willfully when he picked the lock on a gun cabinet with toothpicks, loaded a .22-caliber rifle, shot to death his 9-year-old brother Ulysses in his bed then shot his mother Marina in the right shoulder and stabbed her with a knife and scissors.

On the witness stand, Hardy said Gudino gave him a step-by-step account of what happened in the house, starting with the night before the shooting.

The family went to bed around 9 p.m. that night. The boy reported having trouble sleeping, heard noises and was concerned there was a ghost in the house. He left his bed and tried to sleep on a couch.

“He saw two shadowy figures that scared him,” Hardy said. “He pulled up the covers and went to sleep.”

“He remembers – as in a dream – going down to his brother’s room…He remembers shooting the ghost, although he told me he saw blood before he shot.”

Then Gudino went upstairs to the kitchen.

“The next thing he remembers is his mother crying while wrestling for the scissors,” Hardy said.

Senior Deputy District Attorney Shannon Gerhart asked Hardy how he reconciled his theory about the boy with what Gudino told a detective on tape: that he was angry at his brother over Ulysses being allowed to stay home from school. She also noted that Daniel Gudino described trying to kill his mother by shooting her between the eyes.

Hardy said he thought that the detective had suggested the idea that Gudino was angry at his brother during the interview.

“One has to be extremely careful in interpreting what Daniel said,” Hardy testified.

“People can create some delusional beliefs when they have these symptoms,” he added. “He (Gudino) might volunteer a motive to try and guess why something may have happened.”

Testimony in the hearing is expected to conclude tomorrow. Fourth Judicial District Judge David Shakes will then decide whether there’s enough evidence to support the charges and whether the case should be transferred to adult court.

For more court coverage, go to the Sidebar blog at Gazette.com