Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, November 22, 1994 TAG: 9411220121
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: KATHY LOAN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: PULASKI LENGTH: Medium
Hampton, 35, was scheduled to go to trial Dec. 8 on a charge of maliciously wounding Robert H. "Bobby" McDaniel.
But Monday, Hampton's attorneys were granted a request for a comprehensive mental examination to determine whether Hampton was sane last Nov. 8. That's when authorities say Hampton and Gary O. Shanks, a friend and also a paroled murderer, went to McDaniel's Hazel Hollow Road home, beat him with a claw hammer and robbed him of more than $100.
The mental examination also will help determine whether Hampton is competent to assist in preparing his defense.
Shanks, 31, pleaded guilty last week in Pulaski County Circuit Court to being the one who beat and robbed McDaniel. He will be sentenced later.
Hampton was paroled from prison in 1992 after serving time for the 1975 murder of a 95-year-old Montgomery County woman. Hampton and Shanks met in prison in 1980. Shanks was paroled in 1993 after serving about 13 years for the 1979 murder of a teen-ager he got a ride from at a Blacksburg street festival.
David Skewes, one of Hampton's attorneys, urged Circuit Judge Colin Gibb to grant the request even though Hampton has already undergone several examinations which showed he had a drinking problem and a possible schizoid personality disorder. Given Hampton's record, the state's toughened attitude toward parole and the serious charges he faces, it's likely that "this is the last time that he is going to go into the Virginia system," Skewes said.
Gibb ordered that the evaluation be completed by Dec. 31.
A Pulaski County grand jury's indictment of Hampton on Feb. 22 for McDaniel's beating set in motion a two-week search for him during which time he racked up charges in three states. Besides the charges involving McDaniel's beating, Hampton is charged in West Virginia with raping a woman and stealing her car; beating an elderly Montgomery County garage owner and taking $500 from him; forcing two Maryland women to give up their car at an Ironto rest area; and abducting a North Carolina woman from her car at a Greensboro shopping center. He was captured on March 7 in Greensboro.
In July, Hampton pleaded guilty to the Greensboro abduction and was sentenced to 30 years in prison. Hampton is scheduled to appear in Montgomery County Circuit Court Nov. 30 to have an attorney appointed to represent him on the charges he faces there.
by CNB