Oregon standoff: David Fry suffers from schizotypal personality disorder, mental health expert to...

Oregon standoff: David Fry suffers from schizotypal personality disorder, mental health expert to testify

A mental health expert will testify at trial next month that Oregon standoff defendant David Fry suffers from schizotypal personality disorder characterized by paranoia, anxiety and heightened suspicions that are exacerbated by stressful events, his attorney said Tuesday.

Fry's attorney Per C. Olson intends to argue at trial that his client mostly kept to himself, observing quails and other wildlife at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, until the Jan. 26 police fatal shooting of occupation spokesman Robert "LaVoy'' Finicum on a rural road between the refuge and John Day.

It was the shooting and the resulting "echo chamber'' that Finicum was "unjustly murdered'' at the hands of law enforcement that triggered Fry's fear that federal agents were going to come after him, his attorney argued. The shooting of Finicum shooting led Fry to hunker down in a campground at the far western edge of the refuge parking lot until his surrender Feb. 11, Olson argued.

Fry, the last holdout at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in the 41-day occupation, is one of eight defendants set for trial Sept. 7. He has pleaded not guilty to conspiring to impede federal employees at the federal wildlife sanctuary in Harney County.

Read more: http://www.oregonlive.com/oregon-standoff/2016/08/oregon_standoff_david_fry_suff.html