The 23-year-old man charged with the triple murder on Tantalus last week is under suicide watch at the O'ahu Community Correctional Center, his lawyer said yesterday.

The lawyer, Brook Hart, said such measures are routine for cases such as the one against his client, Adam Mau-Goffredo, who has been diagnosed with suffering from a mental disorder and now faces charges of first-degree murder, a home invasion robbery and related counts.

Hart said he had not received any reports of problems involving his client.

"I'm not sure what his mental status is. I'm not sure what his feelings are. I'm not sure what his physical situation is except that the prison reports he's there and they're watching him," Hart said.

But the prominent defense lawyer said when he talked to his client, "his behavior, from my perspective, appeared to be consistent with mental illness."

Hart said his client was living with his caretaker at Palolo Avenue at the time of the fatal shootings and robbery.

He said he doesn't believe Mau-Goffredo was using crystal methamphetamine recently, and the lawyer said he is still investigating allegations made by his client's mother in a 2002 court petition that his client abused ice and alcohol.

Mau-Goffredo was supposed to be on medication for his mental illness, Hart said, but the lawyer said he did not have any information on whether his client took the medication.

Hart also said it's too early to say whether he'll raise the insanity defense, but if he does, Mau-Goffredo will join a list of defendants charged with some of Hawai'i's most notorious crimes seeking an acquittal by reason of insanity.

Mau-Goffredo is charged with fatally shooting taxi driver Manh Nguyen and a married couple, Jason and Colleen Takamori, at the Tantalus lookout, driving off in the cab and robbing three people at a Round Top Drive home. He was arrested later Thursday night in a Jaguar from the Round Top home.

He is scheduled to appear at Honolulu District Court today for a public preliminary hearing to determine if the prosecution has enough evidence to send the case to trial.

The hearing will be canceled if city prosecutors obtain an indictment from the O'ahu grand jury on the charges in confidential proceedings this morning.

The indictment also would send the case to trial.

City prosecutors declined to comment on the case because it's still pending, according to Jim Fulton, spokesman for the prosecutor's office.

All three victims were shot in the head, the city Medical Examiner's Office said. Autopsy results showed that Jason Takamori was shot twice in the head, and that his wife Colleen and taxi driver Manh Nguyen were each shot once in the head.

Mau-Goffredo apparently had a troubled past.

In 2002, his mother, Lynette Mau, sought a restraining order with court papers alleging that her son abused ice and alcohol and threatened to kill her.

In an unrelated case, he was placed under the guardianship of his mother and Palolo caretaker William R. Carroll Jr. last month. Court papers in the case said Mau-Goffredo had been diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic and he was unable to care for himself.

Mau-Goffredo's father, Francis Goffredo, a Kane'ohe resident, hasn't been doing well and was in seclusion yesterday, said the father's lawyer, Jim Wright.

"He's really overwhelmed with sadness and feels the tragedy of the harm to the innocent victims and the families," Wright said.

MOTHER GOT CUSTODY

The father did not have any significant involvement with the son following a divorce with the mother, who was awarded custody about 18 years ago, Wright said.

But the father feels "terrible, Wright said.

"He's still his son," he said.

Goffredo has not talked to his ex-wife in a "very, very long time," Wright said. The only communications with her are through her lawyer, he said.

Wright said the father does not have any history of paranoid schizophrenia.

Mau-Goffredo, grandson of Waikiki developer and businessman William K.H. Mau, was known to visit or stay at the Kahala Mandarin Oriental Hotel.

Dorothy Douthit, principal of the Academy of the Pacific when Mau-Goffredo was briefly a student in 1996, said he didn't finish one quarter at the school because of disciplinary problems.

"He was asked to leave," Douthit said from Vermont, where she is vacationing. "He definitely did not graduate."

If Hart raises the insanity defense, Mau-Goffredo's court case likely will focus on the evaluation of experts on whether he should be acquitted because of a mental disorder.

But even before the case reaches that stage, a state judge might have to determine whether he is mentally fit to stand trial — that he understands the proceedings against him and can assist in his defense.

If he is declared unfit, the criminal case is suspended until he can meet the competency requirements. And if it is determined that he will never be fit, the criminal charges would be dropped, an extraordinarily rare outcome for a murder case. Mau-Goffredo would face a civil commitment to Hawai'i State Hospital.

RELEASE UNLIKELY

But regardless of which scenario plays out in the case, it's highly unlikely Mau-Goffredo will be released into the community anytime soon.

Other Hawai'i criminal cases invoking the insanity defense make clear that mental illness alone won't lead to an acquittal.

Byran Uyesugi had suffered from a delusional disorder, but a Circuit Court jury rejected the insanity defense and convicted him of shooting seven fellow Xerox employees in 1999. It is the state's worst mass murder.

On the other hand, Micah White, whom experts said suffered from disorders that included schizophrenia, was acquitted by reason of insanity of killing his mother and aunt by stabbing them and torching the family's Kailua home in 2004.

It's up to the jury or a judge (if the defendant waives his right to a jury trial) to determine whether to convict or acquit by reason of insanity.

But one key in the case is the finding of the court-appointed panel of mental health experts who evaluate the defendants.

In the Uyesugi case, the court-appointed experts unanimously concluded Uyesugi was not legally insane. But in the White case, the panel found him to be legally insane based on his disorder, which included delusions that his mother and aunt were vampires.

The panel's unanimous finding led to a judge granting the insanity acquittal.

Reach Ken Kobayashi at kkobayashi@honoluluadvertiser.com.