Mental Exam in Sex Offender Case
A federal judge has ordered mental evaluation for a convicted sex offender charged with failing to register. U.S. District Judge Neal Biggers in Oxford, Miss., ordered the exam in a ruling Thursday. The order says the evaluation will be used to determine if Cleve Calloway Gordon is competent to stand trial or was legally insane at the time of the alleged offense, from February to April. Gordon, 26, was convicted of sexual battery in 2004. The indictment in the latest case says he failed to update his sex offender registration in Mississippi and didn’t register in Arkansas. His attorney, Gregory S. Park, asked for the evaluation in May. “The facts and circumstances of this case indicate that the defendant likely suffers from a serious mental illness, and there is reasonable cause to question his competency. Defendant Gordon has a long history of mental illness and has attempted to physically harm himself since being taken into custody,” Park wrote in court records. Gordon is being held in the Lafayette County jail. Park said Gordon draws Social Security disability benefits and has not recently received medication for his mental illness.
