By Andrew Dalton
Contributing Writer
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A Superior Court judge set a June 2 hearing this week for a Florida woman charged with the attempted murder of Grammy award-winning artist Rihanna and more than a dozen other felonies.
At that hearing, Judge Shannon K. Cooley is expected to decide whether 35-year-old Ivanna Lisette Ortiz is mentally competent to stand trial for shooting at the Beverly Hills-area home of Rihanna, her partner A$AP Rocky and their three children while all of them were on the property.
Ortiz, who has pleaded not guilty, is being held on $2 million bail pending the upcoming hearing. Authorities have not discussed a motive or described any connection between her and Rihanna.
Earlier this week, Cooley ordered psychiatric evaluations and temporarily transferred the case to a Hollywood mental health court that specializes in determining whether defendants can understand the proceedings and go through a trial. If Ortiz is found incompetent, she could be held indefinitely in a state hospital until she is deemed competent to face the charges.
At a meeting held in a judge’s chambers this week, Deputy Public Defender Derek Dillman said he had doubts over the mental competence of his client, court documents showed.
“It is the ethical obligation of counsel and the court to ensure that Ms. Ortiz’s rights are protected, including being able to assist counsel in conducting a defense in a rational manner,” Dillman said in an email to the Associated Press.
Prosecutors declined comment.
Police and prosecutors allege that on March 8, Ortiz pulled up in a Tesla to Rihanna’s home, pointed an AR-15 style rifle out the window and sprayed at least 20 bullets toward the property and a neighboring house. No one was injured.
Shots hit an Airstream trailer that Rihanna and Rocky were inside, according to police interviews with the couple. Investigators found bullet holes in the trailer and on the exterior wall of the home’s second-floor nursery, where the three kids were with their nanny.
Investigators said that after her arrest later that day, Ortiz told them, “I wasn’t attempting murder,” according to a police report.
Ortiz also is charged with multiple counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm and three counts of shooting at an occupied vehicle or dwelling. She had no prior police record, authorities said. Public records show she had been a licensed speech pathologist for more than a decade.
Andrew Dalton writes for the Associated Press.
