Defense Attorneys Seek Insanity Plea in Murder Case

The attorneys for Michael Eric Ballard, 37, are attempting to seek an insanity case for their client who has been charged with killing four people last summer.

On June 26 it is believed that Ballard killed these four people while they were vacationing in eastern Pennsylvania: Alvin Marsh Jr., 87; Steve Zernhelt, 53; Denise Merhi, 39 and her father Dennis Marsh, 62. He was already on parole for a murder conviction in the case of a 1991 murder in Allentown; he had a 15 to 30 year parole for that case alone.

Ballard's attorneys say that their client may have an organic brain dysfunction according to preliminary tests. However, they cannot conclude this completely without running additional tests like brain imagine scanning.

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