By Chris Taylor
Paducah, KY – A psychiatrist and a psychologist testified in federal court yesterday that convicted Heath High School shooter Michael Carneal is exaggerating his mental illness. The therapists' testimony comes on the fourth day of hearings to determine if Carneal was too incompetent to appeal his guilty but mentally ill plea in a timely manner. Psychologist Charles Clark and Psychiatrist Elissa Benedek testified Carneal gave differing accounts of his reasoning to open fire on classmates, which killed three and wounded five others in 1997. Both say Carneal began blaming voices in his head some four years after the shooting and originally told doctors he shot the students because they had bullied him and called him names. The Paducah Sun reports neither doctors went so far as to say Carneal was faking mental illness.