The woman accused of firing 20 shots at Rihanna’s Los Angeles home had had her attempted murder case suspended.
Judge Shannon Cooley halted the case against Ivanna Ortiz after meeting privately with a public defender and finding enough evidence to question Ortiz’s mental competency, a court source confirmed to Rolling Stone on Tuesday.
Ortiz is accused of shooting at the house with a semi-automatic rifle, prompting the singer to push husband A$AP Rocky to the ground to take cover.
She will now be referred to the county’s mental health court for an evaluation and a determination on whether she can understand the proceedings against her.
The ruling came a week after the judge denied a similar request, articulating that there was not enough evidence at the time to override Ortiz’s demand to go to trial. Ortiz was not in court to hear yesterday’s decision.
Ortiz has pleaded not guilty to one count of attempted murder, 10 counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm, and three counts of shooting at an inhabited dwelling.
Prosecutors claim she drove to Rihanna’s home on 8 March and fired the rounds while the property was occupied by the famous couple, their three young children, and the Umbrella singer’s mother.
At a prior hearing, Deputy District Attorney Alexander Bott called the incident “an extremely dangerous deliberate shooting in occupied homes”.
He said the shooting lasted several seconds and could have been deadly.
