NAHA, Okinawa — An Air Force psychiatrist Monday said Kevin Parks was admitted to the mental health unit of the U.S. Naval Hospital on Camp Lester twice during the week after he beat and raped an Okinawa prostitute Oct. 1.
Parks, 22, was diagnosed as having a bipolar mood disorder, but the mental health staff didn’t know how dangerous the unemployed son of an Air Force nurse really was, testified Maj. James C. Brown. And they did not know about the rape.
Brown spent four hours on the stand in Naha District Court answering questions about Parks’ mental health before and after the rape incident. Parks pleaded guilty in January to rape involving an injury and faces a sentence of five years to life at hard labor in a Japanese prison. His defense called Brown to the stand to give evidence in mitigation for sentencing, contending that Parks was mentally impaired.
During previous hearings, Parks said he heard the devil’s voice in his head telling him to rape and kill the woman during an altercation in a sex shop called Shampoo, located in Okinawa City. He testified that he hit the 22-year-old woman in the face with a beer bottle, punched her several times and then raped her, but refrained from killing her after he heard the voice of God telling him to spare her life.
Last week, the sex shop where Parks attacked the victim was placed off-limits to all III Marine Expeditionary Force and Marine Corps Bases Japan personnel. The business is one of many small shops in the Misato district of Okinawa City known by U.S. servicemembers as “Hooker Hill.”
Brown testified that he first saw Parks in February 2006 and diagnosed him as being depressed and having a substance abuse problem.
He said he prescribed an antidepressant and did not see Parks again until the afternoon of Oct. 1, 2007, the same day as the rape. He said Parks never followed up on his treatment.
“He came into the [Kadena Air Base] clinic with his parents in a very agitated state,” Brown said. “He was very confrontational, and we sent him to the hospital for an evaluation because of the state he was in.”
Parks was diagnosed as having wild mood swings, indicative of a bipolar disorder, Brown said. Parks also admitted to abusing over-the-counter cough medicine, taking more than 60 pills to get high, the major said.
When he was discharged on Oct. 3, Parks’ mood swings were somewhat stabilized, but the treatment team had recommended he be sent back to the U.S. for further treatment, Brown said. Parks was readmitted Oct. 7 and was discharged again Oct. 9, the day he was arrested for the rape.
In January, Parks’ mother, Capt. Wanda Parks, an Air Force nurse on Kadena Air Base, testified that when she checked her son into the psychiatric unit on Oct. 1, the timing was a coincidence and she knew nothing of the Hooker Hill incident.
She said she first heard about the rape when police officers came to their Kadena base home Oct. 9. The family had packed Parks’ bags and he was to fly to the States the next day.
Following Brown’s testimony Monday, the three judges decided to appoint another psychiatrist to conduct an independent diagnosis, taking the rape incident into consideration.
No date has been set for the next hearing.
