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Wanda Barzee

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After years of legal wrangling over her mental state, Wanda Eileen Barzee was ordered Friday to spend 15 years behind bars for helping her husband kidnap Elizabeth Smart and hold her captive for nine months.

She was sentenced first in federal court, and then a short time later in state court.

Prosecutors on Monday dropped state charges against a woman in the 2002 abduction of Elizabeth Smart in exchange for a guilty plea related to the attempted kidnapping of Smart’s cousin.

Doctors at the Utah State Hospital said last fall that Barzee had responded to the treatment and was competent.

Atherton accepted that determination Monday but said Barzee remains mentally ill.

A state court judge said Friday the Utah State Hospital has determined that the woman charged in the 2002 kidnapping of Elizabeth Smart is competent for trial.

The hospital’s finding — provided in a report three days ago to Judge Judith Atherton — was announced in Salt Lake City’s 3rd District Court. It could mean the case of Wanda Eileen Barzee is headed toward trial, although Atherton first must rule Barzee competent.

In letters written to her mother, the woman charged in the 2002 kidnapping of Elizabeth Smart has sought forgiveness for any pain she has caused and says she expects to spend the rest of her life in prison.

Meanwhile her estranged husband will soon face another competency hearing.

Brian David Mitchell, accused in the kidnapping of Elizabeth Smart, does not meet the criteria for forced medication, a 3rd District judge ruled Thursday.

Judge Judith Atherton wrote in a 44-page decision that the likelihood that psychotropic medications would help Mitchell is too low to warrant forcing him to take them.

U.S. District Attorney Brett Tolman subsequently announced Friday that his office has started the process to prosecute Mitchell in federal court.

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