Judge finds man not guilty

• By JASON BROWN
• Advocate Acadiana bureau
• Published: Jan 21, 2009 - Page: 1BA - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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LAFAYETTE — A district judge found a 23-year-old Broussard man not guilty by reason of insanity on three counts of attempted second-degree murder Tuesday in connection with a Dec. 12, 2006, rampage in which he stabbed three employees of Moss Motors Select.

Lee Michael Williams will be committed to the Feliciana Forensic Facility until he is found to no longer pose a danger to others or to himself, ruled District Judge Patrick Michot.

Williams was brought up before a sanity commission three times, and doctors ruled each time that he was not competent at the time of the offense.

No one has denied Williams committed the offenses.

Williams suffers from bipolar disorder and schizophrenia and was not on his medication at the time of the offense, according to his defense attorney, Eric Neumann.

Now on his medication, Williams was deemed competent to stand trial.

The ruling came after a short trial Tuesday afternoon in which the victims recounted the strange, random and terrifying experience. None of the victims had ever met Williams before Dec. 12, 2006.

Employee Rodney Lafleur was the first to encounter him.

Lafleur had walked out toward the back of Moss Motors Select, in the 4600 block of Johnston Street, shortly before the business closed for the day.

Lafleur, standing next to a pressure washer, said he saw Williams approaching and heard him mumbling to himself.

“What’s that?” Williams asked him, pointing toward the machine near his feet.

“What?” Lafleur said he responded.

“Is that a bomb?” Williams asked him.