A novel defence

AP report:

A Cornell University doctoral student from New Zealand who is charged with slashing his wife’s throat on a nature trail in central New York plotted the killing and tried to destroy evidence by setting their home on fire, a prosecutor said at his murder trial Thursday.

The defence doesn’t dispute that Blazej Kot, 25, killed Caroline Coffey, a postdoctoral researcher at the Ivy League school. But Joe Joch, his lawyer, countered in opening statements that Kot suffered from a psychiatric disorder known as “Capgras delusion,” which made him think his 28-year-old companion had been replaced by an identical-looking impostor.

The trial isn’t in New Zealand, so I can safely say Good Luck running that line.

While Kot will admit to the killing last June on the Black Diamond Trail near the couple’s apartment on Ithaca’s rural outskirts, the notion that he was propelled by an “extreme emotional disturbance” beyond his control is contradicted by his attempt to burn bloody clothing, computer records and other physical evidence, the prosecution said.

Funny that.