Taheri-Azar committed to Dix
Published: Mon, Mar. 05, 2007 11:03AM
Modified Mon, Mar. 05, 2007 12:33PM
E-Mail
Print
tool name
closeHILLSBOROUGH -- The man accused of driving onto the UNC-Chapel Hill campus a year ago and striking nine people, was committed to Dorothea Dix Hospital this morning after unleashing a string of expletives in Orange County Superior Court.
Mohammed Taheri-Azar, who had appeared clean shaven and composed in recent court appearances entered the courthouse unshaven and wearing an orange jail jumpsuit.
"What the [expletive] is this [expletive]?" he asked.
Related Content
More Mohammed Taheri-Azar
Turning to those in the courtroom, he said, "Everybody, I hate all Americans and all Jews."
"Death to Israel," he added.
In January, Taheri-Azar, 23, formally pleaded not guilty to nine counts of attempted first-degree murder and nine counts of felonious assault.
His plea runs counter to statements he has made about the day he drove a rented sport utility vehicle by the Pit area on the university campus. None of the people hit required overnight hospitalization.
Before today, Taheri-Azar was being held at Raleigh's Central Prison in lieu of $5.5 million bail.
He has written five letters to the court in recent months, all of which have been sealed by Superior Court Judge Carl Fox.
At today's brief court appearance, he also turned to his lawyer, public defender James Williams, and asked, "Who is this fool? Who is this moron? I don't know who this moron is."
Williams described his client as a very mentally disturbed man.
Get it all with convenient home delivery of The News & Observer.
The News & Observer is pleased to be able to offer its users the opportunity to make comments and hold conversations online. However, the interactive nature of the internet makes it impracticable for our staff to monitor each and every posting.
Since The News & Observer does not control user submitted statements, we cannot promise that readers will not occasionally find offensive or inaccurate comments posted on our website. In addition, we remind anyone interested in making an online comment that responsibility for statements posted lies with the person submitting the comment, not The News and Observer.
If you find a comment offensive, clicking on the exclamation icon will flag the comment for review by the administrators, we are counting on the good judgment of all our readers to help us.
