Kissimmee woman accused of killing husband found incompetent

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Kissimmee woman accused of killing husband found incompetent

County News

Friday, 29 June 2012 13:28

News-Gazette Photo/Andrew Sullivan
Lianyenly Prieto, 40, who is accused of killing her husband in July of 2011, sits in an Osceola County courtroom during a competency hearing Thursday. A judge found her incompetent to stand trial for a second time.

By Fallan Patterson
Staff Writer
The Kissimmee woman accused of stabbing her estranged husband to death and setting her father’s house on fire in July 2011 was Thursday found incompetent to stand trial for the second time.
Lianyanely Prieto, 40, was found incompetent to assist in her own defense for her first-degree murder and arson charges after reviews conducted by three mental health professionals deemed her mentally unfit.
Prieto, also known as Lianyanely Prieto-Fernandez, dressed in a loose-fitting red and white striped prison-issued outfit, failed to recall her last name to Ninth Circuit Court Judge Jon B. Morgan and giggled when the judge asked her if she knew.
“She probably needs to go to a state hospital,” prosecutor Bradford Fisher said.
Morgan ruled Prieto would remain incompetent – she was previously found incompetent in February – and would be committed to Florida State Hospital, a state-run mental institution, in Chattahoochee under the care of the Florida Department of Children and Families to try to reinstate competency.
Prieto is scheduled for another competency review in January.
Carlos Troetsch-Fuente, 52, was found stabbed to death and with a knife blade impaled in his eye by Kissimmee firefighters July 21, 2011 as they fought a blaze at 2227 Catherine St. in Kissimmee. Neighbors witnessed Prieto covered in blood throwing a knife in a neighbor’s garbage can.
Through police interviews, it was determined Prieto allegedly got two knives from kitchen, set a small fire in her bedroom and lured Troetsch-Fuente into her room before attacking him.
“He attacked me. I had to defend myself,” neighbor Lourdes Swingle told detectives Prieto told her the morning of the incident.
The couple’s then-13-year-old daughter told detectives she saw her mother stab her father but didn’t realize at the time that the man was her father, instead believing he was “a crazy man in the backyard.”
“I don’t want the police to take my mom, like if my dad is like almost dying or dead,” the teen told police. “I only have my grandpa and you know, I need my mom.”
The girl also told police her mother suffers from schizophrenia and takes medication for it. The teen described a night when her mother was not taking her medication and slept in the backyard “with her ear pinned to the ground, mumbling” to the dead people she believed were under the house.
“My mom suffers from something in her brain. She believes things that aren’t true,” the girl said. “I think my mom did all this because she’s schizophrenia (sic). I think she might have believed that my dad did something really bad.”
Prieto’s father, Raul Prieto, told Kissimmee police detectives in July that his daughter was previously diagnosed with depression and was “permanently” placed on medication, according to police reports.
Prieto apologized when detectives told her Troetsch-Fuente died and said she hoped his family forgave her.
“Imagine, that’s not easy,” she said.
She then spoke of her mother dying from a “sickness” and that her brother committed suicide.
“Look, I had a lot of pressure in my head. I wasn’t understanding, I don’t know, who loves me and who doesn’t,” Prieto said of the incident. “Perhaps my mind is not like yours. I’m not a witch. I made a mistake because I’m kind of crazy.”
Prieto also accused Troetsch-Fuente of inappropriately touching their daughter after discovering multiple “hickeys” on the girl’s arm several days before the incident. She also told police she had a dream a few days before where she was attacked but didn’t die.
Prieto received stitches in her thumb where she was injured during the attack.
Additional charges
Prieto also is charged with battery by a detainee in a detention facility and aggravated battery with a deadly weapon with intent to cause great bodily harm for a August 2011 incident inside the Osceola County Jail.
While in jail for the July 21 incident, Prieto allegedly attacked her cell mate, Retha Scholes, after pouring water over Scholes head and “talking crazy” which Scholes said made her scared.
A corrections officer handcuffed Prieto and left the women together in cell while the officer left to retrieve leg restraints. While the officer was gone, Prieto managed to free one of her hands from the handcuffs and allegedly beat Scholes about her head, face and upper torso, resulting in numerous lacerations, the police report stated.
Prieto was pepper sprayed by the responding corrections officer after she refused to stop attacking Scholes.
As a result of the attack, Scholes was transported to the hospital, where she received 15 stitches to close wounds to her head and face. Her left eye was nearly swollen shut and her hair was matted with blood, the report stated.
Prieto told a jail corporal she wasn’t sorry she attacked Scholes because “witches” were standing behind Scholes and telling Prieto to “beat her up.”
At the time, Scholes was incarcerated for domestic battery, aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, aggravated battery and battery on a law enforcement officer.