October 1977 offenses

The October 1977 offenses are the crimes that brought William Milligan’s fragmented sense of identity into a consequential legal dispute: what happened during the offenses, and whether he was responsible for them at the time, were questions separate from his later ability to stand trial. The surviving accounts include a robbery attributed to Ragen, conflicting descriptions of the women’s experiences, and psychiatric assessments that eventually shaped the court’s ruling on the indictment.

The Offenses and Their Accounts

In the early hours of October 14, Ragen concluded that the young ones needed food and clothes for the coming winter and decided to rob someone. Before dawn, he left on foot toward the Ohio State University campus, carrying a Smith and Wesson and dressed in running shoes, jeans, and layers suitable for the outing. This account presents the robbery as a response to the group’s immediate financial difficulty, but its stated purpose does not lessen the seriousness of the act.

The later accounts of the three women at the center of the indictment did not agree. During a discussion of trial strategy, Arthur said that Adalana believed the women had cooperated, had not been injured, and had been given part of the money back. Judy Stevenson rejected that version, and neither she nor Gary Schweickart accepted the claim that the women had consented. The dispute is essential to the episode: Arthur was describing Adalana’s perception, not offering an account accepted by the defenders or the victims.

The scenes involving Donna West and Polly Newton likewise show fear and sexual coercion, not evidence that either woman welcomed what was happening. In a deserted area, Donna sat waiting, distressed about what might happen; her assailant raised the possibility of rape, and she said that she was afraid. In Polly’s encounter, Adalana asked for sex, Polly began to cry, and Adalana said she would not hurt her. These details do not resolve every disputed allegation, but they make clear why a claim of cooperation could not simply stand in for the women’s accounts.

From Evaluation to Trial

The offenses were later examined through evidence about Milligan’s mental state. In January 1978, after the public defenders obtained funding for a psychological evaluation, Willis C. Driscoll tested Milligan on January 8 and 13. The intelligence tests produced a score of 68, which Driscoll said had been lowered by depression. He diagnosed acute schizophrenia and described a severe disturbance in Milligan’s sense of identity, difficulty distinguishing himself from his surroundings, and voices he experienced as issuing commands. Driscoll concluded that Milligan could not then assist adequately in his own defense and urged hospitalization for further examination and possible treatment.

On January 19, Judy Stevenson and Gary Schweickart presented Driscoll’s report to Judge Jay Flowers as evidence that Milligan could not assist with his defense. The resulting legal dispute concerned the use of statements made during a court-ordered examination by Southwest Community Mental Health Center. The defenders sought a guarantee that those statements would not be used against Milligan; a compromise limited questioning about incriminating statements to a circumstance in which he took the stand. The evaluation addressed his capacity at that stage of the proceedings, not by itself his responsibility during the October offenses.

By September, George Harding Jr. judged Milligan competent to stand trial because he had achieved a fusion of his multiple personalities. Harding nevertheless concluded that Milligan had been mentally ill and not responsible for his criminal conduct in the last half of October 1977. His report thus separated present competence from responsibility at the time of the offenses: improvement sufficient to participate in court did not, in his view, establish that Milligan had been able to control or understand his actions when the crimes occurred.

Ruling and Significance

At trial, Judge Flowers dismissed the first rape count for lack of corroborating evidence and the absence of a similar modus operandi. On the remaining counts, the medical evidence had been stipulated, and the judge found that the doctors agreed Milligan had been mentally ill at the time of the offenses, unable to distinguish right from wrong, and unable to refrain from the acts. With no contrary evidence before him, Flowers found Milligan not guilty by reason of insanity on counts two through ten.

The verdict did not erase the conflict between the victims’ accounts and Adalana’s interpretation of events. Instead, it resolved the legal issue of criminal responsibility on the stipulated medical evidence, while preserving a separate distinction between Milligan’s condition during the offenses and his later fitness to stand trial. In this way, the October events remained both alleged crimes with contested particulars and the basis for a ruling about the consequences of severe mental illness.