A decision that could see an Oregon man who took his mother’s severed head into a supermarket be released into a community treatment facility has sparked fury.
Joshua Webb, 43, has lived at the Oregon State Hospital in Salem since he pleaded guilty except for insanity in the killing of his mother, 59-year-old Tina Webb, and the stabbing of a grocery store employee in 2017.
Following the gruesome act, psychiatrists for both the prosecution and defense diagnosed Webb with schizophrenia and psychosis at the time of the murder.
They said Webb had hallucinations, delusions and spoke to and heard voices in his head despite taking anti-psychotic medication for a year.
But Dr. Karl Mobbs, a forensic psychiatrist involved in Webb’s treatment for the past 18 months, argued that he should be transferred from the state hospital to a 16-bed residential treatment facility called Lifeways McNary Place.
Joshua Webb, 43, pleaded guilty except for insanity in the killing of his mother, 59-year-old Tina Webb, and the stabbing of a grocery store employee in 2018
He has lived at the Oregon State Hospital in Salem ever since, but a doctor now says he is well enough to be transferred to a residential treatment facility
He advocated for Webb’s ‘conditional release,’ telling the Oregon Psychiatric Security Review Board on Wednesday that Webb now accepts the need to take medication, the Oregonian reports.
The doctor said he avoids conflict with other patients and takes part in classes and ‘therapeutic opportunities’ more often than other patients.
Webb has done so well, Mobbs said, that he now lives in the lowest security level at the psychiatric hospital – with roughly the same restrictions he would encounter at Lifeways McNary Place, and has privileges that include working in a greenhouse on the hospital grounds.
‘Mr. Webb has been doing well for several years,’ he told the five-member board in a virtual hearing, as Webb sat next to him in a room at the state hospital.
But a woman who identified herself as the daughter of Mike Wagner, a supermarket employee Webb stabbed multiple times, opposed the transfer.
‘I do believe in the justice system as well as rehabilitation to some extent,’ she said, according to the Oregonian.
‘However, due to the violent and horrific crimes committed on that day, I just don’t believe justice has been served.
‘It’s a terrifying thought to think anyone capable of those actions on that day would be able to be released from any kind of custody,’ she added.
Webb carried his mother’s head into the Harvest Market Thriftway, drank a soda, then attacked Wagner without warning.
Webb carried his mother, Tina’s head, left, into the Harvest Market Thriftway, drank a soda, then attacked a supermarket worker without warning
Oregon Department of Justice lawyer Elisabeth Warner also urged the board to keep Webb at the state hospital – pointing to what she said was a documented lack of empathy and an apparent reluctance to apologize for his crimes.
But Mobbs said it’s hard for Webb to talk about the horrifying violence he committed on May 14, 2017.
‘I have managed to talk to him about it privately and I do see that he has empathy around what’s happened,’ he said, though he admitted that Webb’s empathy is ‘probably on the lower end of normal.’
Still, he insisted Webb was ‘extremely ill’ when he acted violently ‘and so he feels that on the other side of the table that people would understand that it was his illness that caused him to act that way.’
Warner, though, said she was unmoved.
‘My concern is that removing Mr. Webb from the structure and familiarity of the hospital could lead to more harm than good for everyone involved in this case.’
Scott Healey, the first assistant for the Clackamas County District Attorney, also opposed the move – calling Webb’s spree of violence extraordinary.
‘This particular individual shouldn’t be released on any type of conditional release at this time,’ he said.
Webb admitted to killing his mother, dismembering her body and killing his dog
Prosecutors have said Webb had problems with his vision and lived at home so his parents could care for him.
In the weeks before the brutal slaying, his mother had confided that Webb ‘had been doing weird things lately’ and was ‘losing his mind,’ court papers say.
The odd behavior only escalated, with Webb believing his girlfriend was trying to kill him and injecting him with an unknown substance and that Fox TV ‘owned him.’
He also told his girlfriend that a black box in the garage contained a device that was recording him, and complained of feeling like a squid was sucking onto the back of his head two months before the murder.
By Mother’s Day 2017, surveillance footage from Harvest Market Thriftway showed Webb running into the store with his mother’s head and large knife.
Bystanders managed to detain the then 36-year-old until police arrived on the scene.
Webb later admitted to killing his mother, dismembering her body and killing his dog.
He also confessed to killing his dog and later stabbing Wagner, though he never gave a motive for the brutality.
