Arizona woman sent to psychiatric facility in attempted insulin murder

KINGMAN, Ariz. — A Colorado City woman accused of trying to kill her diabetic husband with an insulin overload told a sentencing judge Wednesday she hopes to get well at the Arizona State Hospital, a mental health facility in Phoenix.

Susannah Holm, 35, will be held and treated at the secure facility for up to five years after pleading guilty but insane to attempted first-degree murder.

Prosecutor Ken Skousen said Holm believed voices in her head relayed the command of God to kill her husband for her erroneous conclusion he was molesting their children.

Her husband fended off the attack in June when he awoke from his sleep as Holm stood over him holding six insulin-filled syringes.

“I hope they send me to a good place where I can get some help,” Holm told Mohave County Superior Court Judge Pro Tem Derek Carlisle.

Her “spiritual husband,” through a union approved by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints that is not recognized as a legal marriage under Arizona law, told Carlisle he hopes his wife returns home once doctors determine she is fit for discharge.

“This woman is very loved by me, her family and lots of people,” he said.

Colorado City is on the border with Utah, about 160 miles northeast of Las Vegas.