A man accused of planting a homemade pipe bomb near Colonial Williamsburg in October has been found competent to stand trial – although a psychologist believes he may be feigning mental illness.
Thirty-year-old Stephen James Powers, a former Colonial Williamsburg maintenance employee, appeared in the Williamsburg-James City County General District Court Thursday morning for a hearing regarding his competency.
During the hearing, court-appointed psychologist Dr. Kevin McWilliams testified to Powers’s competency, saying he has seen Powers four times since November and believes there is “significant malingering,” or feigning, of psychiatric illness and memory loss.
Defense attorney John Konstantinou asked for Powers to be hospitalized for a second opinion, to ensure he was not suffering from any true mental illness.
Prosecutor Kathy Black said Powers was in possession of several documents while he was at the Virginia Peninsula Regional Jail. The papers described a potential “hit” on his wife, types of bombs used in the Oct. 19 incident near Colonial Williamsburg, the location of additional bomb-making materials at his house in Gloucester, and instructions on how to build bombs.
McWilliams told Judge Colleen Killilea the content of the documents stood contrary to what Powers had told him in interviews that suggested he was mentally ill.
McWilliams said in his four interviews with Powers, the 30-year-old demonstrated subtle symptoms of psychosis and schizophrenia, but the symptoms were inconsistent with what those mental illnesses should be like.
Schizophrenia rarely surfaces at 30 years old, the psychologist added.
McWilliams said Powers also demonstrated memory loss, but only regarding the time frame when the pipe bomb was planted at Colonial Williamsburg.
Powers told McWilliams “the demons are eating part of my memory,” McWilliams said.
Despite the request from the defense, Judge Colleen Killilea found Powers competent to stand trial, but ordered McWilliams to perform another psychiatric test to see if Powers was sane at the time of the alleged offense.
Powers will remain in jail.
Powers is scheduled to appear again in court on March 8 at 8 a.m. for a status check on the sanity test.
