Dissociative Identity Disorder in the Courtroom

Facts of the Case

Janice Larue and Goering Orndorff married in 1993. By 2000, the marriage had begun to unravel. Suspecting that her husband was unfaithful, Ms. Orndorff consulted a divorce attorney and told her mother-in-law that she “would see him dead before he left her for another woman” (Orndorff v. Commonwealth, 628 S.E.2d 344 (Va. 2006)). Given her professions of love at other times, the mother-in-law was not alarmed. After returning from an anniversary dinner the evening of March 20, 2000, Ms. Orndorff placed two phone calls, one to an attorney who was a family friend and the other to the 911 operator, reporting that she had shot her husband in self-defense after he came at her with a knife and a baseball bat. During the 911 call, she was alternately lucid and calm, disoriented and agitated. Later that night, police found Mr. Orndorff on the kitchen floor shot five times; he held a knife in one hand and a baseball bat in the other. Ms. Orndorff was arrested and charged with murder and use of a firearm in the commission of a murder.

At the request of the defense counsel, Ms. Orndorff was examined before trial by two mental health professionals, who found that she had a propensity to dissociate her emotions and actions from her conscious awareness, but did not suffer any mental disorder that would support an insanity defense. Although Ms. Orndorff introduced testimony to establish that she had amnesia after the shooting, she did not pursue an insanity defense. The jury found her guilty of both charges.

Ms. Orndorff's mental state deteriorated in jail while awaiting sentencing. The trial judge doubted that she could properly participate in the sentencing phase of the trial and ordered a competency evaluation. Ms. Orndorff was found not competent and was committed to Central State Hospital, where she was hospitalized for eight months. During the hospitalization, an increasing number of alter personalities manifested themselves to various professionals. The dissociative identity disorder (DID) experts consulted by the hospital diagnosed Ms. Orndorff with DID, but other mental health professionals, including those observing her during her lengthy hospitalization, disagreed. Eventually, Ms. Orndorff was found competent, and the case proceeded to the sentencing phase.

Before sentencing, the defense moved for a new trial based on the “newly discovered” evidence of DID, asserting that this evidence could be used at a new trial to establish insanity at the time of the crime. The trial judge deferred ruling on the motion until the completion of the sentencing hearing. The court permitted Ms. Orndorff to present her DID diagnosis to the jury during the sentencing phase as mitigating evidence. During the sentencing hearing, the court heard testimony from the DID experts. In addition, however, the jury heard that Ms. Orndorff attempted to bribe a witness to claim falsely that she was physically abused by her husband and that she told her prison cellmate that she was manipulating doctors in claiming multiple personalities. Forensic experts testified that the crime scene was manipulated, contradicting Ms. Orndorff's account of acting in self-defense, and the court observed Ms. Orndorff's behavior alternating between normal and bizarre, based on whether the trial appeared to be proceeding in her favor. The jury sentenced Ms. Orndorff to 32 years' imprisonment for murder and an additional 3 years for the firearms offense.

After sentencing, the defense renewed the motion for a new trial. The trial judge rejected it, holding that Ms. Orndorff's evidence of DID would not produce opposite results at another trial, as the jury had heard that evidence and nevertheless sentenced her to a lengthy imprisonment. A series of appeals followed.

Rulings and Reasoning

Granting of a new trial on the basis of alleged newly discovered evidence requires an appellant to demonstrate that the evidence: … (1) appears to have been discovered subsequent to the trial; (2) could not have been secured for use at the trial in the exercise of reasonable diligence by the movant; (3) is not merely cumulative, corroborative, or collateral; and (4) is material, and such as should produce the opposite results at another trial [Orndorff, p 180, citing Odum v. Commonwealth, 301 S.E.2d 145 (Va. 1983)].

In a series of appeals following the trial, the Virginia Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court of Virginia focused primarily on the second and the fourth requirements of the Odum test: discoverability and materiality. In 2006, the supreme court ruled that Ms. Orndorff met the second prong. With regard to the fourth prong, materiality of the evidence, the court held that the trial court relied on an incorrect standard in its application of the materiality prong. The court held that the lengthy sentence imposed by the original jury was not an indicator of what a new jury would have decided at a new trial. In addition, the supreme court held that the trial court was required to make its own determination of materiality of the evidence of DID, instead of relying on the jury's decision.

Consistent with the supreme court mandate, the trial court reviewed the case, as well as the applicable case law, and received additional arguments from the parties. The trial court ultimately concluded that the new evidence lacked sufficient credibility to permit a new jury to examine whether Ms. Orndorff actually was diagnosable as having DID. As such, she had not satisfied the materiality requirement for granting a motion for a new trial. In addition to the reasoning provided following the initial trial, the trial court cited lack of evidence of childhood trauma, which DID experts argued was necessary for the person to develop DID, and Ms. Orndorff's shifts in defense strategies, which included initially claiming self-defense, then amnesia for the shooting, and finally insanity caused by DID. The trial court further ruled that even if the jury were to find that Ms. Orndorff had DID, its presence would not permit the jury to acquit her, because no evidence established that her mental disorder rendered her legally insane.

The court of appeals affirmed this judgment in an unpublished opinion, and in 2010, the Supreme Court of Virginia agreed. In its 2010 holding, it specifically indicated that it made no finding about the issue of whether a defendant with DID may ever assert an insanity defense.