Attorney claims ‘insanity defense’ in murder trial of Ridgewood artist

Render Stetson-Shanahan is charged with murder for allegedly stabbing his roommate Carolyn Bush to death inside their Ridgewood apartment in 2016. Photo courtesy of Pamela Tinnen.

By David Brand

Neither the Queens prosecutors trying the case against Render Stetson-Shanahan, nor the defense attorneys who represent him dispute that he stabbed his roommate to death inside a Ridgewood apartment in September 2016. Stetson-Shanahan himself admitted to the killing.

But as defense attorney Zachary Margulis-Ohnuma delivered his closing argument in a weeks-long bench trial Wednesday, he painted a picture of Stetson-Shanahan as a “kind and gentle” man who “went crazy” the night he killed Carolyn Bush, a beloved writer and his acquaintance from their time at Bard College. 

“All of [the signs] point to an insanity defense,” Margulis-Ohnuma said.

“He’s ranting up and down naked on the street,” he added as he showed Justice Richard Buchter surveillance video filmed near Bush and Stetson-Shanahan’s Stanhope Street apartment the night of the stabbing attack. “He’s oblivious to the blood pouring out of his thigh … he goes back to bed and lies there to wait [for police].”

Stetson-Shanahan, his beard thick and his brown hair slicked back and held with pomade, sat and listened to his attorney describe how he experienced a “total psychotic break” that caused him to do “something unspeakably horrible.” Stetson-Shanahan stabbed Bush during his first-ever schizophrenic episode which followed an undiagnosed “prodromal” stage — a period where people with schizophrenia display early signs of the illness — Margulis-Ohnuma said.

Stetson-Shanahan had also smoked “serious weed from Colorado” and got drunk with his brother earlier in the day, exacerbating his mental health crisis, Margulis-Ohnuma said. After stabbing and killing Bush, he sliced his own leg and walked outside holding the knife and began punching cars.

“The violence can’t be explained by any rational process,” Margulis-Ohnuma said. “There’s not going to be a satisfying explanation for the violence.” 

“You’re not going to see another case like this,” he told the judge. “This is a once-in-a-career case.” 

Stetson-Shanahan is charged with second-degree murder for the stabbing. Queens prosecutors say he was aware of his actions the night the stabbing assault and was even able to describe what happened immediately after the killing.

“This is a disturbing case that ended with the death of a young, innocent woman,” said late District Attorney Richard Brown after Stetson-Shanahan was arraigned in September 2016.

The defendant’s family and about a dozen supporters sat behind him on the right side of the courtroom. About 30 of Bush’s friends and family members filled the other side of the courtroom.

“She just had a clarity and wisdom that was way beyond her years,” Bush’s friend Pamela Tinnen told the Eagle. “There was a calmness of being around her because she had comfort in her own skin that was contagious.”

Stetson-Shanahan has been held on Rikers Island since the killing. If convicted he faces up to life in prison.