Man who clubbed 4 to death in New York heard voices telling him to kill – Lawyer

The lawyer to a man who is on trial for bludgeoning four homeless men to death with a metal bar as they slept on the street in lower Manhattan tells court that he heard voices telling him to kill.

The suspect had been diagnosed with schizophrenia when he left jail months earlier and was hearing voices telling him he needed to kill 40 people or he would die too, his lawyer told jurors on Tuesday.

Randy Santos, 31, is asserting an insanity defense at his trial in state court. Through his lawyers, he has acknowledged committing the 2019 Chinatown rampage.

But, they argue, he is not criminally responsible because mental illness has polluted his mind with irrational thoughts and left him prone to violence.

If they succeed, Santos could be sent to a psychiatric treatment facility instead of prison, Daily News wrote.

“He needed the voices to stop. He needed to save his own life,” Santos’ lawyer, Marnie Zien, said in an opening statement. “He saw no other way out.”

Santos, 31, has pleaded not guilty to charges including first-degree murder in the deaths of Florencio Moran, Nazario Vásquez Villegas, Anthony Manson and Chuen Kok and attempted murder charges for assaults that left two other men severely injured.

They were among 319 killings in New York City in 2019, including 52 in Manhattan.

Surveillance video captured Santos “repeatedly lifting the bar up over his head and bringing it down on the head” of one victim, Assistant District Attorney Alfred Peterson told jurors.

A couple out on a date on Manhattan’s Bowery Street saw him beating another man with the same weapon, Peterson said.

Police found Santos carrying the bar, which was covered with blood and hair. Testing showed it had his DNA on one end and blood from some of his victims on the other, the prosecutor said.

Verdict will determine if Santos goes to prison or mental facility.

If the jury convicts Santos, rejecting his insanity defense, he could be sentenced to life in prison. Otherwise, he could be involuntarily committed to treatment for as long as necessary.