Reino Bodady

The attempted murder trial for a Fort Dodge man accused of stabbing a 71-year-old woman in October 2020 has been suspended pending the results of a competency evaluation.

Reino Valentino Bodady, 37, was set to go to trial today in Webster County District Court. He was charged with attempted murder, a Class B felony, after police say he stabbed a female relative with a knife in the neck and abdomen in the early hours of Oct. 26.

However, during the final pretrial hearing on Monday afternoon, Bodady’s defense attorney, Judd Parker, said that after meeting with his client several times over the weekend, he was concerned that Bodady “is not appreciating the proceedings or able to effectively assist in his defense.”

“He has made it clear that he will not go to trial with me tomorrow,” Parker told District Court Judge Kurt Stoebe during the hearing on Monday.

Parker’s concern moved him to request that Bodady undergo a competency evaluation, which the prosecution initially resisted.

“The defense has had the funds and the time to get this evaluation done for Mr. Bodady and then the day before trial, he decides it would be an opportune time to get this done,” said Assistant Webster County Attorney Bailey Taylor. “I don’t see how that is appropriate in this instance.”

Taylor noted that with Parker’s initial request for a psychiatric evaluation for Bodady, the defendant would not waive his right to speedy trial. The state has 120 days after Feb. 1, 2021, when the Iowa Supreme Court reopened jury trials, to bring all defendants demanding speedy trials to trial. That deadline expires June 1, and Webster County has several defendants to go through jury trials before that date, Taylor added.

“I fail to see how it is appropriate that the day before trial, he wants to get all of these things done that he’s had ample opportunity to do in the five months prior to trial,” she said.

To give further evidence of his client’s need for a competency evaluation, Parker told the court that Bodady “he has a very particular way he thinks trial and things need to go and any advice or instruction how trial might go otherwise or be prepared otherwise, he believes is illegal and I’m working against him.”

Parker said Bodady has accused him of “covering up” for his witnesses and that the jail is recording Bodady and Parker is complicit in these recordings.

Stoebe gave Bodady the opportunity to make a statement during the hearing.

“I’m frustrated and not happy with his services,” Bodady said of his defense attorney, saying that he didn’t even know what time on Tuesday his trial was supposed to start.

Stoebe ordered that the probable cause needed to order a competency evaluation was adequate and suspended the proceedings of the case until Bodady can receive an evaluation at the Iowa Medical and Classification Center (Oakdale).

Also on Monday, the charge against Bodady was amended by prosecution, revising the charge from a Class B felony to a Class B forcible felony, which means, if Bodady is convicted and sentenced, he would have to serve a minimum of 70% of his prison sentence before becoming eligible for parole.

Bodady had previously motioned for the court to dismiss his charges, claiming that his right to a speedy trial was violated with the delays in court proceedings caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Stoebe rejected that motion on April 5.