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Man who decapitated his mother found guilty except for insanity

Joshua Webb will be in the custody of the state Psychiatric Review Board for life.

OREGON CITY, Ore. -- A man who cut his mother's head off on Mother's Day 2017, carried it into an Estacada grocery store where he attacked an employee with a knife, was found guilty except for insanity to murder.

Joshua Webb, then 36, suffers from "Schizophreniform Disorder" and likely was unaware of the crimes he committed that Sunday, May 14, according to psychologists who evaluated him. He still hears, then responds to voices.

In addition to killing his mother, Tina Webb, and attacking the grocery store employee, Mike Wagner, he also stabbed his favorite dog Cooper many times until it died.

File: Store employee recovering after attack in gruesome killing

File: Friend says man in decapitation murder loved his mother

Webb waived his right to a trial and a judge ruled on the stipulated facts for the death and the assault. Webb will be in the custody of the state Psychiatric Review Board at the Oregon State Hospital for life.

Webb's family and relatives of Mike Wagner, the store employee, expressed dismay that Webb was not sentenced to prison, according to the AP.

"Josh Webb is my brother, and I believe this sentence must have prison time behind it, or my mother's death will forever be without true justice," Sarah Morris-White said in a statement read in court. "He must pay for his sin."

It was Morris-White who discovered her mother's headless body, making a 911 call that brought a phalanx of police officers to the home, then to the Estacada store.

Webb, wearing a black- and white-striped jail suit and shackled at the wrists and ankles, did not make a statement in court.

Court documents say in the time leading up the attacks, Webb, who lived in an outbuilding on his mother's property started acting increasingly bizarre.

He was convinced that Heather Suydam, his ex-girlfriend that he had kicked out of the outbuilding, wanted to kill him with a knife.

She told investigators, among other things, that he started to act bizarre in March of 2017. He complained of what felt like "a squid sucking at the back of his head."

He accused her of drugging him and making porn movies with him. He said she was married with children, which she was not. There was a black box in the garage recording them.

Suydam said Webb knew there was something wrong with him and at one point, turned his firearms, including and assault rifle, in to the Oregon City police.

Webb was injured in the struggle at the store and was sent to a hospital in what police described as a catatonic state. He tested negative for illegal substances.

Some 24 hours after the incident, he rose in the hospital bed and announced "I had a nice nap."

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