## Facts

- Paula J. Frendak and coworker Willard Titlow left their Washington, D.C. office within minutes of each other; Titlow was soon found fatally shot in the building’s first-floor hallway.
- Frendak fled Washington, traveled through multiple locations, and was arrested abroad after refusing to surrender her passport.
- A search of her baggage revealed a .38-caliber pistol, ammunition, empty cartridges, and a pocketknife.
- She was returned to the District of Columbia and indicted for first-degree murder and carrying a pistol without a license.
- Before trial, the court conducted multiple psychiatric examinations and found Frendak competent to stand trial, despite a mental disorder.
- At trial, Frendak refused to raise an insanity defense; the jury found her guilty on both counts.
- After the verdict, the judge—concerned by psychiatric evidence—conducted a separate sanity proceeding and, over Frendak’s objection, presented an insanity defense; a jury then found her not guilty by reason of insanity on both counts.

## Issues

1. Whether the evidence was sufficient to support the jury’s finding of premeditation and deliberation for first-degree murder.
2. Whether a trial judge may impose an insanity defense over the objection of a defendant found competent to stand trial.
3. Whether competency to stand trial, by itself, establishes competency to waive an insanity defense.

## Decision

- The court held the evidence was sufficient to support the first-degree murder conviction.
- The court held a judge may not impose an insanity defense on a defendant found competent to stand trial if the defendant intelligently and voluntarily chooses to forgo that defense.
- The court rejected the view that competency to stand trial automatically establishes competency to waive an insanity defense.
- Because the record did not clearly establish that Frendak’s rejection of the insanity defense was intelligent and voluntary, the court remanded for further proceedings focused on that question.

## Legal Principles

- The decision whether to assert an insanity defense is a fundamental choice reserved to the defendant, not the judge, when the defendant is capable of making that choice intelligently and voluntarily.
- Competency to stand trial (understanding proceedings and assisting counsel) is distinct from competency to waive the insanity defense.
- When a defendant rejects an insanity defense, the trial court must conduct an additional, focused inquiry to determine whether the waiver is informed and voluntary in light of the nature and consequences of the defense and its alternatives.
- A court may interpose an insanity defense only if the defendant lacks the capacity to make an intelligent and voluntary waiver of that defense.

## Conclusion

The court affirmed the sufficiency of the evidence supporting Frendak’s first-degree murder conviction but limited judicial power to impose an insanity defense, requiring a separate determination that a competent defendant’s refusal of insanity was not an intelligent and voluntary waiver before a court may override it; the case was remanded for that waiver determination.


Frendak v. United States, 408 A.2d 364 (D.C. 1979)