Two psychiatrists who evaluated former University of Texas student Kendrex White after he fatally stabbed a fellow student and wounded three others reached the same conclusion and determined he suffered from a mental illness that was so severe at the time of the May 2017 attack that it prevented him from discerning right from wrong.

The findings in their reports were shielded from the public for several months until Tuesday, when prosecutors stepped into a Travis County courtroom for the start of White's trial and told state District Judge Tamara Needles they had accepted the doctors' conclusions and believe White meets the state's legal definition of insanity.

Needles entered a judgment of not guilty by reason of insanity. The rarely granted ruling means the judge agreed that severe mental illness had inhibited White's ability to distinguish right from wrong when he killed 19-year-old Harrison Brown in the middle of the day near UT's Gregory Gymnasium. Three other students survived the attack without life-threatening injuries: Stuart Bayliss, who required surgeries to his back and to his right hand; Jonathan Han, who needed staples to close a cut to the back of his head and therapy sessions to make sense of the event; and Eli Kahan, who declined an invitation from prosecutors to testify at Tuesday's setting.

White is the 53rd defendant in Travis County in the past 10 years to be found not guilty by reason of insanity and to be confined to a mental hospital rather than sentenced to jail or prison. In the next month or so, White will transition from the Travis County Correctional Complex to the maximum security North Texas State Hospital in Vernon and stay there until he is has fully recovered from his illness.

But that might never happen, Dr. Maureen Burrows testified, because the schizoaffective disorder that has afflicted White is incurable. Burrows, who was appointed by prosecutors to evaluate White, said the former student also deals with bipolar disorder. When she evaluated him this spring, Burrows said, he was so detached from reality that he believed he was Jesus Christ. White heard berating voices that told him he was not worth living, the doctor testified.

"He didn't think the world was real," Burrows said. "What he was doing was not real."

Burrows evaluated White twice after the attack: once in May this year and again in June. By that time, a doctor hired by the defense, John Fabian, had already met with White and found him to be insane. Burrows said White had little recollection of the attack but conceded that based on other people's accounts of the incident he was the killer and should "burn in hell."

Tuesday's proceedings were unconventional as lawyers for both sides presented testimony from witnesses despite the plea agreement — because, District Attorney Margaret Moore said, she wanted the community to hear evidence about the case that would show why her office accepted the doctors' insanity findings.

Several of White's friends testified that he began acting strangely in early 2017. On the day before the attack, they said, he had been noncommunicative during lunch and got up to leave the restaurant they were in without saying goodbye.

Justin Glaze said White, a third-year biology major, had stopped regularly attending the Spanish class they took together — and when he did come, "he seemed completely checked out."

Burrows said she believes the stress from college triggered White's illness.

Brown's mother, Lori, recalled the second of her two sons as an amazing singer who never met a stranger and was guided by Christian values.

She later spoke at a news conference and said she has "no sympathy or empathy for Harrison's murderer." She added: "I hope and pray he will never have an opportunity to harm another person."

Brown said she believes that White is not the only person responsible for her son's death. She declined to elaborate in a separate conversation with the American-Statesman other than to say: "I believe there was more than one person responsible for (White) being on that campus that day."

White's mother, Shantina, had testified that weeks before the attack, police took her son to University Medical Center Brackenridge after he had sent a text message to his parents indicating suicidal thoughts. Staff at the hospital released her son in a cab after deciding he was just stressed out from school and not a danger to himself or others.

A day earlier, White had been released after nine days at a mental hospital near his parents' home in Killeen.

Lori Brown criticized UT leadership for not sending any representatives to Tuesday's setting, a sentiment echoed by Bayliss, one of the attack's survivors, who said the university had treated him and other victims in the case like a "trash bag thrown to the side."

Made aware of the criticism, Soncia Reagins-Lilly, vice president for student affairs and dean of students, released a statement saying: "Our level of representation at the trial today does not reflect a lack of support, care or concern. We have and will continue to support the family and students impacted.”

White, now 22, did not speak in court and instead took notes on a legal pad. He wore a black and white jail uniform with dark glasses and a scruffy beard. He has put on considerable weight in the 19 months he's been behind bars due to side effects of the antipsychotic medication he's been taking, Burrows noted.

Outside of the courtroom, White's lawyer, Jana Ortega, said her client's illness has improved slightly due to medication but that he likely will remain in the mental hospital for another decade or more. Per state laws, White can go before Needles once a year, so the judge can weigh whether to release him back into the community.

"Mr. White is very remorseful, and if there's anything he could do to change it, as well as his family, they certainly would," Ortega said. "Unfortunately, it goes to show mental illness can affect anyone at any time, no matter the color of your skin, or where you live, or where you go to school."