5 Years In, Murder Case Rattles System

A groundbreaking murder case has been ticking away at the state courthouse on Church Street for more than five years now. It has yet to come to trial — but it’s already headed to the state Supreme Court for a second time, testing the rules for how Connecticut prosecutes murders and when seemingly delusional people may serve as their own lawyer.

The case has also raised the question of how the state’s psychiatric hospitals are evaluating defendants who must be deemed competent to stand trial to begin with. Are psychiatrists probing deeply or not at all? Is the standard too low? This is especially relevant if a defendant intends to represent himself, mount a trial and take charge of the nature of his defense.

The story begins on April 26, 2010 when a Yale doctor named Vajinder Toor, then 34, was shot to death as he left his Branford condo on Blueberry Lane to go to work. The police promptly arrested Dr. Lishan Wang, now 49, on charges of shooting Dr. Toor in his heart and his head, and trying to shoot his then pregnant wife.

When he was gunned down, Dr. Toor was a postdoctoral fellow at the Yale School of Medicine working with the infectious-disease section of Yale-New Haven Hospital. He and his wife had a 3‑year-old son.

The evidence at first seemed clearer-cut than in many such cases. When police inspected Dr. Wang’s red minivan they found three handguns, 1,000 rounds of ammunition, Google Earth directions to Dr. Toor’s condo, and, a photo of Dr. Toor. The police also found information about two other former colleagues, both involved in Dr. Wang’s dismissal from Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center in Brooklyn in 2008. Police called to tell them of Dr. Toor’s murder. Shell casings found at the murder scene matched Dr.. Wang’s guns, the police said.

There were no other suspects, physical evidence was left in place, and a subsequent probable cause hearing, which Dr. Wang sought, found that there was probable cause that the crime was committed and that Dr. Wang was the perpetrator, the judge found.

That was in 2011. So far no trial. None in sight.

How did we get to this point? And what does it mean for the state court system and for the law? Read on for a primer.

Workplace Dispute

Wasn’t this a clear-cut case from the start?

Yes, it seemed so. What was fascinating about it was how quickly the police found Dr. Wang and how long the case has taken to get to trial. The cops were on it immediately/ In fact, when some of the evidence was later revealed in court, it was clear that Branford was Dr. Wang’s first stop. He had two other stops to make. Had he been able to get on I‑95, going toward New York and Brooklyn, he might have committed additional murders.

Who was Dr. Lishan Wang?

Dr. Wang was raised in Beijing, China. He emigrated to America on a student visa but obtained his permanent resident legal status — or green card — in 2004. He began his residency in internal medicine at Kingsbrook on July 1, 2006, and was reappointed on July 1, 2007. His supervisor was Dr. Toor, who served as the chief resident for internal medicine at Kingsbrook at the time. This is a classic workplace dispute gone terribly wrong.

What was the workplace dispute?

It centered on Dr. Wang’s disappearance at a time when he was supposed to be taking care of patients at a particular time. Apparently the charge was that he fell asleep or that he didn’t respond to calls. Dr. Wang has consistently denied this. Dr. Toor said he wasn’t doing his job properly, that he had been looking for him for several hours in the afternoon, was unable to find him; and that the nurses and other residents were unable to find him earlier that morning. He was not allegedly answering pages from the ICU on that day, May 15, 2008. 

Was he some kind of high-achieving person who was running into some problems? Do we know much about who he was?

We don’t know much about who Dr. Wang is now, or in 2008 at Kingsbrook, in part because he hasn’t told doctors about his past. There is virtually no public information about his parents, for example. He has not provided the Connecticut Valley Hospital personnel with any release forms that would allow them to investigate his past. They do not have access to his medical records. Nor did the public defender’s office have those records when it initially defended him.

In fact, after he was fired from Kingsbrook and subsequently filed a lawsuit against the hospital in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn, the hospital’s attorney told the judge that Dr. Wang had refused to authorize or provide his medical and pharmaceutical records. The judge had previously ordered this information be given to the hospital attorney because Dr. Wang ​“alleges disability discrimination and seeks emotional distress damages.”

So this guy is fired from his job at Kingsbrook Hospital for allegedly falling asleep on the job. Dr. Toor was his supervisor … How did that road lead to Branford in 2010?

Dr. Wang was fired from his job at Kingsbrook in May 2008. Police say Dr. Wang was dismissed from the Kingsbrook program ​“for conduct unbecoming a resident.” The committee that evaluated said in a report that Dr. Wang acted in ​“an unprofessional manner toward his superior and used foul and abusive language toward another employee in a public area.”

That firing essentially ended his medical career. He subsequently got two other jobs. He was fired from the first one, a hospital in Queens where he worked for about six months and then found a one-year position as a post-doctoral fellow at Morehouse School of Medicine in Atlanta, Ga. He resigned from Morehouse in February 2010, a spokeswoman told the Eagle. She would not provide further information. He was unemployed at the time of his arrest in Branford in 2010. By then he had lost his license to practice medicine as a physician.

After his last job ended, he, his wife and their three children remained living in Marietta, Georgia. By the time he left for Branford, guns tacked in his Dodge mini-van, he was jobless, having failed at two subsequent jobs. He drove from Marietta to Branford. Directions to the Toor residence were programed into the car computer.

How do we know he had directions?

It came out in court testimony at a hearing.

As for Dr. Toor, he was a rising star at 34. He moved here from India in 2004. He began his residency at Kingsbrook in 2005 where was named Chief Resident until he left to practice at a hospital in Austin, Texas for about one year. In July, 2009, he began his fellowship at Yale Medical School. He was gunned down as he headed for his car at the Meadows condo complex to go to work at Yale.

What time was it?

It was about 7:50 a.m.
So he was just sitting out there?

According to neighbors — and there was testimony in court about this later on — he was lying in wait. He got out of his car. As he saw Dr. Toor come down the steps, going toward his car, Dr. Wang opened fire, police said. Dr. Toor was shot multiple times.

Was his wife outside with him?

His wife heard the sound, heard the gunshots and ran outside.

Was their 3‑year-old son inside?

Yes. His mother ran out. She saw her husband go down. She screamed. Then the gunman shot at her, and missed.

What happened next?
A: He got into his car and drove away. Meanwhile, neighbors contacted the police. The police got right there. They caught Dr. Wang before he got onto I‑95 headed toward New York. The neighbors helped the police enormously.

He was about to get on I‑95. The police stopped him, stopped the car. They pulled him over. They had their lights going; they got him out of the car. There were guns and ammunition in the vehicle. Luckily they stopped him because later on they found the names and addresses of two other doctors at Kingsbrook.

Did Wang confess when they arrested him?

This is where the rubber met the road.

He was interviewed. One could say he did confess though not specifically . He certainly placed himself at the scene of the murder and the bullets were found to have come from his gun, testimony at the probable cause hearing showed. 

At Dr. Wang’s arraignment there was immediate concern about Dr. Wang’s mental state, that he was not competent to stand trial. The first judge, Roland D. Fasano, sent Dr. Wang for a competency examination at Connecticut Valley Hospital (CVH). The issues associated with mental competency have been one of the themes of this case.

Define ​“Insanity”

Some people will say, ​“Well, it’s crazy to go and shoot somebody, so why was Dr. Wang considered crazier than someone else who goes and shoots somebody?”

OK, so there is a difference between mental competency and being crazy. A defendant usually states his defense to the crime later in the case, before trial, for example — a defense of extreme emotional disturbance or insanity. That comes later on. In this case, despite the current judge initially asking Dr. Wang what his defense will be, and even setting a date by which to state it, Dr. Wang has not said.

The standard for mental competency is low. It’s a two-pronged test. One prong is that the defendant needs to understand the charges against him. The other prong is that you are able to assist your attorney in the case.

This part is important. Dr. Wang is indigent. Initially he was represented by the New Haven public defender’s office. But from the outset he would not cooperate with his attorneys. He would tell them very little about himself. They complained in court about his lack of cooperation and about the inadequacy of the competency examination at the hospital. Now in the future perhaps the public defender’s office might require defendants to sign a release for all medical and personnel records. 

So even under that low bar, a shrink looked at this guy and said, ​“He doesn’t even know he is accused of murder and can’t really stand trial”? 

Dr. Wang was sent to a hospital, where the psychiatric folks looked at him and talked to him. They determined initially that he didn’t understand the charge against him – murder – and that he couldn’t assist his attorneys.

So initially he was deemed not competent to stand trial. That was on Sept. 23, 2010. But then he was taught at the Whiting Forensic Institute how the court system works. He learned how to respond to questions. And so while he may have been delusional and seriously mentally ill, he learned how to say what needed to be said in order to be deemed competent. This is how we got here. And I think that’s where the trouble started.

He had been having problems with the public defenders representing him. They had been giving him, they thought, fine representation. But Dr. Wang did not trust the public defender’s office. He did not trust the state. He is a citizen of China. So he did not trust the public defender’s office because the office is paid by the state. But he is also seriously ill; that fact was not considered in his initial evaluations. And there was insufficient information about his past medical or work history when he was permitted to represent himself that year.

What does it mean to ​“restore” somebody?

That’s a fascinating question. When all of this is over, the leaders of the state’s court system will need to examine both the competency process and the pro se representation in court process.

What are the roles of the psychiatric hospitals in our state? In this case the hospital helped provide Dr. Wang with the necessary information so he could answer questions and be declared competent. But he was never treated for the serious mental issues he had and still has. Only now has the same hospital said, ​“OK, it is time to give him psychotropic drugs.” And he has refused.

Is this something we need to look at. Has this not been tested much?

What has not been examined is how these hospitals operate. When the public defender’s office was representing Dr. Wang, it hired an outside expert who said in court Dr. Wang was still not competent to stand trial, even though hospital psychiatrists said he was.

In the end, Judge Fasano agreed with the hospital psychiatrist and said he was competent, even though that hospital psychiatrist asked him no questions about representing himself, which Dr. Wang wanted from the outset. He was officially restored to competency on Feb. 18, 2011, which means he can understand the charges against him and assist his attorney and go forward.

Next came a competency hearing in court. Judge Fasano noted there was a difference of opinion of the psychiatrists. The public defender’s office said Wang was still not competent, but the psychiatrist representing the state said he was. The judge found Dr. Wang to be competent. And it didn’t take long –maybe two or three court sessions, maybe a month or so – before Dr. Wang asked Judge Fasano if he could represent himself.
Knowing what we now know, Dr. Wang was not competent to stand trial or to represent himself. The serious mistakes in this case began early on. In the nearly four years he represented himself he had no psychological evaluations, he did not engage in any sort of therapy, and he was given no anti-psychotic drugs.

In the end the hospital failed to provide a judge tasked with deciding competency and pro se representation with factual knowledge about the defendant’s prior medical or psychiatric history. Dr. Wang had refused to give them any information. That should have been a warning. Perhaps in future cases, a defendant’s refusal to provide prior medical history or other vital information might be a bar to self-representation.

Does a defendant have that right?

He has that right. But if he wants to represent himself I would think the judge needs to know about his past mental health state; perhaps this should be a factor in determining whether a defendant is entitled to represent himself in court. If you don’t release your medical or personnel records to your attorney and/or to the court, then you don’t get to represent yourself, let’s say. A few years later, for example, Dr. Wang questioned whether Dr. Toor was actually dead.

What would have happened if he were deemed not competent to stand trial, ever?

If he’s not competent ever, then he’s sent back to the hospital, and efforts are made to restore him over time. There is no statute of limitations on a murder charge. 

What did Dr. Wang do as his own attorney?
He filed hundreds of motions, often centered on his strife at Kingsbrook and his firing, which he believed was unjustified. The motions showed his current mental state. He also wrote delusional letters to the federal court judge in Brooklyn hearing his case against Kingsbrook. 

But he liked representing himself. It was intellectually stimulating for him. He can be very effective. He can be persuasive; he has a sense of humor. Once a defendant gets to represent himself, the judge at the bench has to walk a very careful line and the judges hearing this case went out of their way to protect his rights and provide for his needs.

Attorney Defendant

Has he pleaded to the charges?

He has entered a plea of not guilty.So while he’s acting as own lawyer from February 2011to early in 2015, he is living at CVH and going to pre-trial hearings in court in New Haven.The compromise, so to speak, was that there was a stand-by lawyer from the public defender’s office assisting him when he asked for legal advice.

So for all these years they were paying a public defender not be his lawyer, but to be there in case he needed one or if the judge wanted to ask a question and he needed advice?

Yes. Though at some times he was living in a prison. So there came a point where, yes, he had a stand-by lawyer. Public defender Jeffrey LaPierre would sit at the table. Then there came a point when LaPierre sat behind him. Dr. Wang did ask for advice sometimes. After all, it is extremely difficult and very complex to mount your own defense in a murder case. 

How do you even know when you’re allowed to talk in court? Or when you’re allowed to ask a question?

Well, procedure isn’t easy. The judges hearing the case over the years reminded Dr. Wang of that and told him of the benefits of being represented by counsel. The judges also helped him when necessary which is what happens in pro se cases. So, yes, you wouldn’t know when to ask a question. You certainly wouldn’t know the procedure …

Trials are a game with rules, a sport.

That’s right. Soon after Dr. Wang became his own attorney, he had begun to file numerous motions – all kinds of motions, virtually all dismissed by the judge as not relevant.

What kind of motions?

Scathing motions on one topic or another, virtually all related to the need to get information from Kingsbrook.

He was stuck on Kingsbrook. That became very clear from the outset. The motions showed delusional he was. They were not relevant to his murder case, but he would file motion after motion. He was fixated – and this later came to be the word that was used when he lost his competency – he was fixated on his time at the Kingsbrook Medical Center and on his firing, and on the destruction of his medical career.

But clearly, that’s allegedly what was behind the murder.

Right. But in his mind the civil case against Kingsbrook was his primary concern, not the murder charges against him. 

So you’ve gone to these crazy, endless hearings on this case. That was their argument for a while: Can Dr. Wang get all these documents? What was the result of those requests?

Mostly they were denied. But those that were accepted dealt with the need for expert testimony in his case, be it psychiatric or forensic or ballistic. The judges tried to keep him focused. That was not easy. Some of his requests presented issues because the motions required interstate subpoenas.

One problem was whether Dr. Wang himself could get the subpoena, because he was no longer technically represented by the public defender’s office, which could put that motion in operation in a heartbeat. Dr. Wang was seeking interstate subpoenas. At various points, Eugene R. Calistro, Jr. (pictured), the senior state’s attorney prosecuting the case, stepped in and sought to help because he wanted the case to move forward. 

Who was supposed to carry that out for Dr. Wang? The public defender’s office?

There was concern about that because since the public defender’s office was not representing him. Dr. Wang had, in effect, fired them. Since Dr. Wang was representing himself, even though he had a stand-by lawyer, it was awkward. Calistro’s offer to help was accepted by all the judges hearing the case.

Supreme Court I

So this is a good legal issue. Say you have someone who’s legitimately trying to represent himself or herself pro se, his own lawyer, and he wants to get documents. He doesn’t have the resources or connections or knowledge that a public defender’s office has. How do they provide that? How do you make it possible for him to get important documents?

That issue actually went up to the state Supreme Court, the state’s highest court, in this case. The question was who would pay for Dr. Wang’s experts, experts he needed to present at trial.

What kind of experts did he want?

He wasn’t too keen on the psychiatric experts, but he was going to need one. He wanted forensic experts; he wanted ballistics experts. The question became: Who’s going to pay for these experts?

At one point, Dr. Wang raised the name of Dr. Henry Lee as a potential expert. Dr. Lee’s expertise lies in the examination of evidence regarding a deceased person. He is a world-renowned forensic scientist who teaches at the University of New Haven. The judge has observed in the past that it is rare to challenge autopsy reports, but Dr. Wang had his own view on whether Dr. Toor is actually dead.

Now if he had been represented fully by the public defender’s office, they would pay for a forensic expert though not necessarily one of Dr. Lee’s stature. But since Dr. Wang had rejected them, even though they had this stand-by lawyer in court, they weren’t going to pay. So this became a problem, because if you were going to go forward with a trial, and Dr. Wang did not have experts, he could say, rightly, ​“I couldn’t call experts.” And that absence, of course would call into question the verdict.

What a mess that judge was in. How much would it have cost to get all those experts?

That’s another issue. Sometimes they will come more cheaply for the public defender and sometimes not. As it turns out, it used to be the judiciary itself has a fund. It could use those funds when necessary to help a defendant, a pro se defendant. But that fund appeared to be depleted.

Meanwhile, Dr. Wang got a new judge in the case, Patrick Clifford. Judge Clifford asked Calistro, the prosecutor, to put together a ​“reservation.” A reservation allows a particular legal problem at a lower court level to be heard at a higher court level because if it’s not heard, other consequences will occur. It’s extremely unusual.

The question facing the state Supreme Court was: Does a pro se defendant – a defendant representing himself – have the right to call witnesses? And who pays for them?

Did Lishan Wang speak before the Supreme Court?

No. He did permit Judge Clifford to assign a lawyer, Max Simmons of the law offices of New Haven Attorney Diane Poland, to represent him. In his brief to the high court, Simmons argued that Dr. Wang is constitutionally entitled to represent himself and as an indigent defendant is entitled to public funds. It took the state’s highest court nearly one year to decide this case.

Whoa!

It was a long time. They were concerned. This was going to have an impact on all courts in the court system in Connecticut.

So what happened?

Finally, the court ruled essentially that pro se defendants were entitled to expert witnesses, and Mr. Public Defender, you’re going to pay for it.

Is it endless? Is there any cap?

There is a cap. There is language in the decision that narrows it, that allows for the pro se defendant to get experts, but it may not necessarily be someone whose fees are off the charts. 

Is there a third-party adjudicator? Someone who can say, ​“This is reasonable and this isn’t”?

The trial judge would be the final arbiter on what is reasonable.

OK, so Dr. Wang won that round. What happened back in New Haven after that?

He came back into court, still filing motions. And a third judge took over, Thomas O’Keefe, Jr., in 2014. He is the assigned trial judge. 

So Long, Jump Suit

It now looks as if there might be a trial. There was discussion about what Mr. Wang was wearing; since he was representing himself, he shouldn’t be in an orange prison jump suit, should he?

So the judge decided he should come dressed appropriately. Now Dr. Wang arrived in khakis and a white shirt to represent himself. He continued filing endless motions on topics not at all relevant to his case. He had trouble understanding how the system works, though it appeared he was getting some help from fellow prisoners.

Judge O’Keefe, who has heard many murder cases, began to understand that the case was somehow stuck, that it was not moving forward. He began to see a defendant representing himself who may have been deemed competent to stand trial but who clearly cannot mount a trial.

What happened next?

At the beginning of 2015, Tom Ullmann, the chief public defender, filed a motion that turned the case on its heels. Relying on federal and state case law, he drew the distinction between a defendant’s competency to stand trial and a defendant’s competency to defend himself at trial and his mental competency to conduct that trial himself.

Ullmann concluded that to continue to let Dr. Wang represent himself would violate both state and federal constitutional law. Ullmann argued at this juncture, more than five years after the crime, Dr. Wang was not competent to stand trial and was not competent to represent himself at trial. The prosecution does not object.

It sounds like a legal war developed, no?

Yes. The war was between Ullmann and Dr. Wang, with Dr. Wang making his feelings clear. He was furious. But Ullmann made a case that Dr. Wang cannot and does not understand the legal process and that accordingly he cannot represent himself.

This was a key conclusion.

Judge O’Keefe ordered Dr. Wang to undergo another round of competency tests, but this time at the request of the prosecutor. Amore detailed examination was required by the court. Remember, at the outset of this case hospital psychiatrists asked few questions, gave Dr. Wang no therapy or meds. Nor did they have access to his prior medical records.

Ullmann said the voluminous filings filed by Wang over the years show that he suffers from a series of mental illnesses, including ​“delusions, persecution complex, paranoia ideation and obsessive compulsive behaviors.” Dr. Wang denied this.

As for mounting a defense, Ullmann said Dr. Wang’s mental incapacity precluded him from employing ​“legitimate affirmative defenses in his case versus illegitimate justification defenses.”

Dr. Wang answered Ullmann, saying in one motion that Ullmann ​“had invaded the pro se defendant’s pro se right like a rapist who had illegally penetrated into the defendant against the victim’s will.” He also called Ullmann ​“incompetent and treacherous,” a description Ullmann rejected.

Dr. Wang was no longer wearing khakis and a shirt.

Right. That changed last April.

April was a big month for this case. O’Keefe ruled after psychiatrists testified that Dr. Wang was not mentally competent and was no longer to act as his own attorney. (He is, however, still filing court papers.)

These were the same doctors who declared Dr. Wang mentally competent more than four years ago. Meanwhile, to Dr. Wang’s dismay and fury, the judge ordered Ullmann to represent Dr. Wang.

Forced Meds

What other action did the judge take?

He appointed a health guardian for Dr. Wang, who was then sent back to Connecticut Valley Hospital, to the Whiting Institute. He was given no medication. He refused to allow blood tests or access to any of his prior medical records.

One of the purposes of appointing a health care guardian was to help decide if Dr. Wang will receive anti-psychotic drugs against his will.

Eventually the health care guardian said Dr. Wang was in need of anti-psychotic drugs. In late October, the prosecutor presented medical experts who testified that Dr. Wang has various psychiatric illnesses and needs to be treated with anti-psychotic drugs. Since his incarceration both in prison and at Connecticut Valley Hospital in Middletown, Dr. Wang has refused all drugs and will not permit blood tests.

In November Judge O’Keefe ordered that Dr. Wang to be forcibly medicated so that he might be restored to competency and face trial on charges that he murdered Dr. Toor. The judge said he was not happy ordering this but had to.

Then what happened?

Then, on Dec. 8, Ullmann formally filed an appeal seeking to overturn the judicial order that he be forcibly medicated. The appeal will delay any forced medication.

“I believe he is mentally ill. I intervened because of that,” Ullmann said in November, recounting his effort to remove Dr. Wang as his own attorney in his murder case and his efforts to re-open his prior competency status. But Ullmann also said that the forcible administration of psychotropic medication requires the state to meet a heavy burden. In his view, the state had not succeeded.

The judge said in his view the state had met the required legal standards. He concurred with Calistro and the testimony of a health guardian appointed in the case and the doctors handling the case at the Whiting Institute.

In deciding to order forced medication, the judge said in court last month that in his view Dr. Wang has become decidedly more ill over the years, describing his mental state as fluctuating between paranoia, narcissism, depression, and delusional behavior. He has also been diagnosed with having unspecified schizophrenia spectrum.

“He is extremely ill,” the judge said. ​“We are trying to return him to competency.” 

So that’s it?

Not quite. It turns out that under state law, a defendant must be restored to competency within 18 months or the case is sent to the state’s probate court. That would likely mean a civil commitment to a psychiatric hospital.

Taking into account Dr. Wang’s first competency hospitalization in 2010 and 2011 and his second most recent one, he has spent 366 days or more than one year in a state of incompetency.

So the only issue before the judge this week was whether to count the time it takes for this appeal to be completed, a time that could range from six months to a year or more, against the 18-month civil deadline.

Calistro said, ​“This time [for the appeal] should not count against the statutory time period of 18 months required under civil law. It has been decided by our Supreme Court.”

Ullmann agreed with Calistro. ​“I am not going to oppose this,” he said. He said the defense has sought the appeal in the first place and ​“it would be frivolous for me” not to toll the time it takes to hear the appeal. Judge O’Keefe agreed, too. ​“This time will not count against the tolling,” he ruled.

As the year 2015 comes to an end, and for the second time in its nearly six-year history — and before any trial — the murder case of Dr. Lishan Wang now heads back to the State Supreme Court.

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