The sister of a man stabbed to death in 2001 said she was “horrified” and stricken with heartache when she learned that the woman who killed her brother is now charged with another stabbing death.
Sandra Baumgartner is charged with murder in the stabbing death of her 57-year-old sister, Sharon Baumgartner, who was found in her apartment in suburban Carpentersville on Monday.
More than a decade ago, Sandra Baumgartner was found not guilty by reason of insanity in the stabbing of Daniel Morgan near Memphis, Tenn. Baumgartner, who had been diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, was briefly institutionalized but later allowed to live with her parents.
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Baumgartner should have been placed in a facility after the 2001 killing, said Marilissa Morgan, Daniel Morgan’s sister.
“This is just very, very tragic,” she wrote in an email. “Of course, the terrible memories of my brother’s death and all the events associated with it resurfaced when I heard this horrible news. It is very surreal.
“Although I have often prayed for Sandra Baumgartner and her family since my brother’s death in 2001 … I am still stunned and horrified at the news about her sister, violently killed in the same way as was my brother.”
The judge who found her not guilty by reason of insanity, John Colton Jr., said he did what the law required with the evidence that was available. While Colton, now retired, ruled her not guilty by reason of insanity, it was appeals judges who allowed her to live with her parents, court records show.
“All I can go by is the proof that’s before me, and I’m required … to follow the law,” he said Friday in a phone interview.
Shortly after her sister’s body was discovered Monday, Baumgartner, 53, was found hiding in a wooded area and arrested. The sisters lived in different apartments in the same complex in the 100 block of South Lincoln Avenue, police said.
In court Thursday, a prosecutor confirmed Baumgartner had been charged with a murder in Tennessee in 2001 in which authorities said she stabbed a man more than 120 times.
Baumgartner didn’t dispute that she and Morgan had an altercation and she stabbed him. But her lawyer in that case argued successfully that she had schizoaffective disorder and did not understand that her actions were wrong, court records show.
At a hearing on her treatment after she was found not guilty, a psychologist said her symptoms were under control and she didn’t belong in a mental institution. Her medication had inadvertently been changed from an antipsychotic medication to an antidepressant, which caused her to mentally deteriorate before the stabbing, the doctor said.
Mental health professionals testified that she was well-behaved when correctly medicated, court records show.
Tennessee appeals judges ordered an outpatient treatment plan that allowed her to live with her parents. Colton noted that he ordered Baumgartner placed in a residential facility before the appeals judges issued their order.
An online obituary shows Baumgartner’s parents once lived in Elgin and later moved to Memphis, where her mother died in 2010.
Marilissa Morgan said Friday that Baumgartner “should have been mandated to seek mental help and placed in a facility that could keep her from harming others.
“Although I do not want to be overly critical of the legal system, it was my opinion in 2001 that those in authority failed to recognize the seriousness of her mental health (problems) and did not administer the appropriate verdict nor the appropriate assistance that she so desperately needed,” Morgan wrote.
“I do think of my brother, Danny, each and every day and do my best to concentrate on the many wonderful and positive memories,” she wrote.
“He is with the Lord, and that gets me through the day,” she wrote.
Asked about the new charges, Colton said, “My sadness is for everyone concerned, the people here in this area, the family of this victim and also the victim up there.”