Defendant Pleads Guilty to Matricide, Found Not Criminally Responsible

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A 51-year-old man accused of killing his mother appeared in mental health court on July 10 to plead both guilty and not criminally responsible for the April 12, 2021, murder.

Mumwaldi Kearney pleaded guilty to first-degree murder for the death of Shari Smith, 68, in order to enter a not criminally responsible (NCR) plea before Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge Gale E. Rasin. Kearney was also charged with having a deadly weapon with intent to injure in connection to Smith’s murder.

After reviewing an NCR evaluation ordered by Kearney’s defense attorney, Janet Andersen, in February 2023, Judge Rasin found Kearney not criminally responsible due to mental illness for the murder.

The report detailed how Kearney, who has been diagnosed with schizophrenia, has a history of delusions with religious themes and believed that he was “under a demonic assault because his mother was ‘challenging the christ in [him],’” at the time of the incident.

During the murder, Kearney believed that the “only way to get the demon out of [his mother] was to continue hitting her,” Judge Rasin read from the report. The official cause of Smith’s death was found to be blunt force trauma and multiple stab wounds, the prosecution had told the court.

Kearney will remain at Clifton T. Perkins Hospital, a maximum security psychiatric facility.

Judge Rasin informed Kearney that he could remain at the facility for the remainder of his life, as a conditional release could only be approved if the hospital sees fit to do so.

Court documents report that members of the Baltimore Police Department (BPD) found Smith’s body face down with visible trauma in the living room of the home she shared with Kearney on the 4400 block of Manorview Road after Kearney told a mental health counselor that his mother was dead.

During a police interview, Kearney allegedly confessed to the murder and told detectives that he stabbed his mother in the chest, documents state.

Kearney was found incompetent to stand trial for the murder three times.