Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By richards on January 20, 2015

A Princeton man was ordered released Friday from Trenton Psychiatric Hospital roughly three weeks after being declared not guilty by reason of insanity of killing a rabbi and injuring another man in a 2013 car crash on Riverside Drive.

Mercer County Superior Court Judge Robert C. Billmeier, the same judge who made the not guilty ruling Dec.23, issued the release order for Eric D. Maltz after a hearing Friday afternoon. The judge said from the bench that a psychiatrist at the hospital had issued a 24-page report recommending that although Mr. Maltz posed a danger to himself, he can be released with conditions imposed.

The judge said those conditions included that Mr. Maltz remain in psychotherapy, continue taking his medications and submit to random drug tests. At least for now, Mr. Maltz also may not have his drivers license back or be allowed to drive, the judge said.

At the hearing, the judge told Mr. Maltzs father, Gary, he would be responsible for supervising his 22-year-old son. The Maltzes live in Princeton. Eric Maltz was due to go home Friday.

He is registered to be a full-time student at Mercer County Community College for the upcoming semester, his father told the judge.

Eric Maltz tried to kill himself around 9:30 a.m. March 28, 2013, by driving a 2003 BMW at a high speed into a parked, unoccupied Toyota Camry on Riverside Drive. The impact caused the Camry to go backward into a parked Toyota Prius that Rabbi James Diamond, 74, was about to enter.

Rabbi Diamond, the former director of the Center for Jewish Life at Princeton University, died at the scene. The occupant of the Prius, Rabbi Robert Freedman, then 63, survived his injuries. The two men had been leaving a Talmud discussion group at a private home, across the street from Riverside Elementary School.

Its a very sad case, said assistant Mercer County Prosecutor Thomas Meidt outside court after the hearing.

Subsequent to the crash, more details emerged about Mr. Maltz. The prosecutors office has said that earlier in the morning of March 28, he had tried to kill himself at home by sitting in a parked car inside a closed garage. The prosecutors office said Mr. Maltz had no memory of driving the car later that morning.

Defense attorney Robert E. Lytle said Friday that Mr. Maltz had made multiple suicide attempts in his life.

Read more here:

PRINCETON: Judge orders release of man found not guilty by reason of insanity in death of rabbi

Category: Talmud
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