A judge has determined that a former drama student at a Connecticut university charged with stabbing two other students is not guilty by reason of insanity.
The judge determined Friday that prosecutors had proved former University of Hartford student Jake Wascher had committed the crimes of first-degree assault and carrying a dangerous weapon during the March 31 attack.
He also found that Wascher’s lawyer had proved that Wascher lacked criminal capacity due to mental disease or defect.
The judge found the 21-year-old San Diego man was “in the midst of a psychotic episode and suffered from paranoid delusions” that the victims were out to harm him.
KTLA sister station WTIC obtained a copy of the police report that said students were gathered to film a stabbing scene from a movie as part of a class assignment when Wascher attacked two other students with a kitchen knife.
He allegedly then told investigators he did it because he was “into his character,” WTIC reported.
Wascher faces commitment to the state’s maximum-security psychiatric facility for people acquitted of crimes because of mental disease at a hearing scheduled for December.
