TAVARES, Fla. (Court TV) — A judge has found a Florida woman competent to stand trial, despite her repeated insistence that a deadly shooting that killed a sheriff’s deputy was the result of spiritual possession.
Julie Sulpizio (Sumter County Jail)
Julie Sulpizio, 60, has pleaded not guilty to murder of a law enforcement officer, attempted murder and battery after a shootout killed Master Deputy Bradley Michael Link and left Sulpizio’s own family dead.
A state mental hospital reported twice that it had restored Sulpizio to competency after her arrest in August 2024, but her defense attorneys challenged that assessment, arguing that the defendant continues to believe that she and those around her are possessed by spirits and demons.
Investigators said that on Aug. 2, 2024, Sulpizio was assaulting her neighbors while ranting about religion; detectives said they later determined that Sulpizio, her husband and their adult daughters were actually trying to lure the neighbors into their own home to kill them. A shootout after deputies arrived killed Link; Sulpizio’s husband and daughters were found inside their home with self-inflicted gunshot wounds.
At a competency hearing in June, two doctors hired by the defense testified that they disagreed with the state hospital’s determination that the defendant was competent. One expert, Dr. Julie Harper, testified that the “defendant experiences delusions involving other personalities referred to as ‘alters,’ often associated with religious figures such as Lucifer, the Archangel Michael, a figure called Malcolm, who may also be an archangel, and Helen, whom she identifies as God’s wife. Defendant believes she is sometimes possessed by these figures and that they possess others as well.” The second defense expert, Dr. Yenys Castillo, said that Sulpizio “believes that Lucifer or Archangel Michael could possess a judge, prosecutor, or defense counsel.”
Judge Brian Welke ultimately sided with the state expert, Dr. Jason Demery, who conceded that Sulpizio’s “beliefs about demons are not delusions, but rather a cultural phenomenon in Christianity that becomes especially pronounced.” Demery also dismissed the argument that the voices Sulpizio claims to hear are hallucinations, arguing instead that the voices are “how she relates to her dead family.”
Welke said that part of his decision rested on the defendant’s behavior during that June hearing. “The Court observed that throughout the seven-hour hearing, Defendant appeared to be attentive and able to follow proceedings: Defendant sat stoically. She did not make any outbursts or otherwise display behavior that would interfere with trial proceedings,” Welke wrote in his order finding Sulpizio competent. “Defendant was able to manifest appropriate courtroom behavior, and nothing suggested she would not be able to do so at trial.”
Sulpizio is scheduled to return to court in October for a plea negotiation conference.
