LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A Kentucky man accused of raping an 8-year-old girl and fracturing her head with a shovel after being found mentally incompetent in a separate sex assault case has again been found mentally incompetent, a news report said.
Jefferson Circuit Court Judge Annie O’Connell determined on Thursday that Cane Madden is mentally incompetent to stand trial and unlikely to regain competency in the near future, WDRB-TV reported.
Madden was charged with first-degree rape, assault and robbery in the 2019 attack on the girl. A Louisville police arrest citation says officers responded to a report of a girl beaten and robbed of her iPad and found her with a fractured skull and injuries indicating sexual assault.
It says Madden was seen nearby and questioned, telling detectives “intimate details” of the assault.
Madden was ruled mentally incompetent months earlier on charges that he sexually assaulted a woman and bit off part of her face in 2017.
Madden has had several cases dismissed due to incompetency and was set free because he didn’t meet Kentucky’s criteria for involuntary hospitalization, the station reported. The state requires a person to be a danger to self or others, to be able to benefit from treatment and that hospitalization be the least restrictive treatment available.
Two state lawmakers have filed a bill to change the state law, but it hasn’t had a hearing.
Meanwhile, prosecutors said they are petitioning again to have Madden involuntarily hospitalized, according to the news report.
