Source: The Straits Times He claims his mind went blank after he thrust the knife into her. He had no idea what he did next, Pathip Selvan Sugumaran, 23, told the High Court yesterday. He is accused of murdering Jeevitha Panippan, 18,between 8.20pm and 9.30pm on 7 Jul last year at an SP Powergrid substation opposite Block 154 Ang Mo Kio Avenue 5. He will be hanged if found guilty. He told the court: “I stabbed her the first time. After that, everything went blank. I cannot even remember pulling out the knife.” But the prosecution disagreed. Deputy Public Prosecutor Ng Cheng Thiam pointed out that Pathip Selvan had told the court previously that “images of her in bed with the other man and the other things she had done to me previously” had gone through his mind when he stabbed her. That, DPP Ng said, showed that his mind did not go blank. Pathip Selvan said that he also told police that he did not know what he was doing at the time and that “something took control of me”. When DPP Ng referred to his statement where he told the police that Jeevitha was holding his hand and screaming when he stabbed her, Pathip Selvan said he heard what she was saying but he did not know what he was doing then. As for “the other man” in the visions, he told the courthe did not know who he was. Last week, he testified that he stabbed Jeevitha after she told him a red-shirted man whom he saw kissing her in the bedroom was “better than him in bed”. In his statement, Pathip Selvan said he closed his eyes after he first stabbed Jeevitha and “swung the knife widely” at her after that. He told the court yesterday: “When I opened my eyes and kissed her, then I realised that I had stabbed her many times. This was after she let go of me and fell to the ground.” A confused Justice Kan Ting Chiu asked him: “Then why did you say that (you had stabbed her) in your statement?” He thought that showed Pathip Selvan knew what he was doing and so contradicted his claim that his “mind went blank”. Pathip Selvan replied that he did not even know what he was doing when he gave the statement. He disagreed with the prosecution’s argument that he knew what he was doing and had intended to kill Jeevitha all along. When psychiatrist Tommy Tan took the stand for the defence, he said it was possible for someone whose mind had “gone blank” to “hear, feel and perceive” the world around him. Justice Kan asked: “He can perceive, he can hear, he can feel. So what does a blank mind mean? This seems like a very active mind.” Dr Tan replied: “I took it to mean that he was not thinking at the time. He could not control what he was doing.” Though he noted that Pathip Selvan was not of unsound mind when he killed Jeevitha, Dr Tan said he was suffering from attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder(ADHD) and that affected his reasoning at the time. Pathip Selvan’s report from Woodlands Secondary School had shown that he was “playful and restless, easily distracted and dreamy”. All these were symptoms of childhood ADHD, Dr Tan said. His mother, Madam M. Saroja, told Dr Tan that Pathip Selvan had been hyperactive since he was a year old. He needed to do things all the time and had a hot temper. “She said Pathip Selvan must do better than his siblings. If his brother gets a handphone that is better than his, he will get angry and break his brother’s handphone,”Dr Tan said. “Only his parents and grandmother can control his temper. After they talk to him, he will keep quiet and walk away. When his siblings talk to him afterwards, he will cry and apologise to them.” Problematic behaviour The supervisor of the Ramakrishna Mission Boys Home, where Pathip Selvan stayed from 1992 to 1996, said he showed “problematic” behaviour, disturbed the other boys and did not do his homework. ADHD is associated with drug abuse, Dr Tan said, and Pathip Selvan told him he often used alcohol, sleeping pills and cough mixture to sleep. During his National Service with the SCDF, Pathip Selvan often took medical leave and argued with his officers. Dr Tan said he disagreed with the findings of Institute of Mental Health psychiatrist, Dr Joshua Kua, who said Pathip Selvan did not have any psychiatric disorder when he killed Jeevitha. He told the court that the details from the Boys Home, which Dr Kua did not have in his report or notes, were relevant. Dr Tan said one reason for the discrepancy between his and Dr Kua’s observations was that Pathip Selvan might pay more attention and be less restless when he wasin a “novel situation” like prison. “The accused has a psychiatric disorder and an abnormality of mind,” Dr Tan said. “If you ask the right questions, you can get the right conclusion.” The trial continues today.