Davie Poplar Fire-Setter Found Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity

By Tristan Dufresne 2/14/19 5:21PM

HILLSBOROUGH — The man charged with six felony counts in connection with the detonation of a makeshift explosive device on the UNC-Chapel Hill campus, injuring a professor and damaging the iconic Davie Poplar Tree, was found not guilty by reason of insanity in a ruling made Wednesday, February 13.

On November 2, 2017, Joshua Daniel Edwards lit both a backpack and guitar on fire by the base of the historic tree, a university landmark more than three hundred years old, before walking away. UNC astrophysicist Dan Reichart attempted to extinguish the blaze by stomping on the bag, when a fuel cannister detonated. The aftermath left Reichart with moderate to severe burns on his face and arms.

Charges against Edwards included the use of explosives to inflict injury, the use of explosives to damage property, assembly of a "weapon of mass destruction," illegal scorching of grassland, assault with a deadly weapon inflicting serious injury and falsifying a police report.

Believed to be more than three centuries old, the tulip-flowering Davie Poplar is named for a general in the American Revolution, William Richardson Davie, who helped found UNC, America's first public university, in 1789.

One month after his arrest, an Orange County judge agreed to release Edwards into the custody of a parent after a written agreement signed by Edwards, his father and the state that compelled mental health treatment until the case was resolved.

Based on the complementary conclusions of both the defense and the state's forensic psychiatric evaluations that he currently suffers from an illness known as schizoaffective disorder, Edwards has been involuntarily committed to Central Regional Hospital in Butner.

According to the criteria laid out in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (Fifth Edition), schizoaffective disorder is categorized as a mood disorder with symptoms that can include delusional behavior, hallucinations, disorganized speech and anhedonia (loss of the capacity to experience pleasure).

"Both his expert and our expert made reports offering the opinion that he was legally insane," Assistant District Attorney Jeff Neiman told reporters with WRAL, adding that Edwards was "not capable of understanding the nature and seriousness of his offense."

"It is my genuine hope and desire that Mr. Edwards continues to receive the help and care that he needs, and is supported by a community as I was," Reichart wrote in a statement released to media.

"I was fortunate that day," Reichart'swritten statement. "The explosion was shrapnel-free. My glasses protected my eyes and probably saved my sight."

After Edwards was initially taken into custody by campus police officers, he lied to investigators, claiming that a second incendiary device was located somewhere in downtown Carrboro. Law enforcement evacuated several town blocks until officials determined the threat to be false.

Edwards will receive treatment in Butner until the court and psychiatrists decide he is not a danger to others or himself.