This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Ogden • As accused murderer Victoria Ashley Mendoza was led into an Ogden courtroom Thursday, the 22-year-old woman huddled against her attorney and exclaimed, "The Weber County jail staff are trying to kill me!"
It was not the first courtroom outburst for the woman, who is accused of fatally stabbing her girlfriend, 21-year-old Tawnee Marie Baird, while the two were driving on Interstate 15 in October.
At a February preliminary hearing, the petite woman yelled that she felt she was being threatened by the victim's family and cried out, "I'll just kill myself. Then you don't have to worry about me," after the hearing was over.
These outbursts, along with concerns that Mendoza cannot adequately understand the charges against her and participate in defending herself, have led her attorney, Michael Studebaker, to ask that the woman's competency be evaluated.
At her Thursday court appearance, a May 7 date was set for a competency review. Judge Joseph Bean also scheduled a seven-day trial, set to begin Nov. 30 and last about two weeks.
Mendoza is charged in 2nd District Court with first-degree felony murder in Baird's Oct. 18 death.
Prosecutors allege that the couple got into an argument while driving on I-15, and that Baird slapped Mendoza and pulled her hair. The defendant allegedly "became enraged and snapped," Weber County Attorney Christopher Allred told the judge in November.
Mendoza then allegedly stabbed her girlfriend 46 times, according to prosecutors.
The defendant's sister, Cindy Spencer, testified at the preliminary hearing that Baird and Mendoza used marijuana and prescription drugs, and both were jealous and controlling of one another. They got into fights that escalated into hitting, kicking and punching, the sister said.
The night that Baird was stabbed to death, Mendoza called her sister and said she had hurt her girlfriend and asked Spencer to come to the Ogden church they had attended growing up. Spencer testified that when she arrived, she found Baird dead in the passenger seat in a car covered in blood.
Mendoza is currently being held in the Weber County Jail without bail.
— The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Twitter: @jm_miller