Sisters tried to have accused murderer committed

Kimberly Ruth Noyes was taken into custody by RCMP in Grand Forks, B.C., in connection with the murder of 12-year-old John Fulton on Tuesday, August 18, 2009. (RCMP)

For years prior to the death of a 12-year-old autistic boy who lived nearby, Kimberly Ruth Noyes' sisters tried to have her committed, they testified Tuesday at her murder trial.

Noyes is on trial for second-degree murder in the death of John David Fulton, whose body was found in her home two days after he disappeared on Aug. 13, 2009, in Grand Forks, B.C., 500 kilometres east of Vancouver.

Barbara Noyes-Ferrier told the B.C. Supreme Court justice hearing the case about an episode that happened in the summer of 2006, when she forced her younger sister to go to the hospital.

Noyes became "extremely angry, yelling, screaming and calling everyone names, saying they would suffer," Noyes-Ferrier testified.

In the hospital, she was combative with nurses and she began screaming for her sister.

Noyes-Ferrier gave her younger sister the necklace she was wearing and Noyes was quite excited about it, "like a little girl." Then suddenly, she pushed Noyes-Ferrier up against the wall and started punching her.

"The police came and they had to wrestle her to the ground and handcuff her," she testified at the court in Rossland, B.C.

Noyes was given medication and the next morning she was sent to the psychiatric ward at Kootenay Boundary Regional Hospital in nearby Trail. She was admitted Sept. 20 and discharged Oct. 5.

"After that, she didn't want much to do with me," Noyes-Ferrier testified at the trial, which is being heard by judge alone.

She recounted getting a phone call about a year later from someone in Grand Forks that Noyes talked of sacrificing her own daughter. Court has heard that at one time Noyes believed she had to kill her daughter and then resurrect her.

Upon hearing of the delusion, Noyes-Ferrier and her husband went to Grand Forks, where they found Noyes delivering a sermon on the street.

When she saw her sister's husband roll his eyes, Noyes became enraged. She started punching her sister, and then bit and scratched at her husband as he tried to restrain her.

"She said my dad was in a black helicopter with Jesus and they were going to come down and kill me because I'd been mean to her," Noyes-Ferrier, of Kelowna, B.C., testified.

Noyes was taken to the hospital, but the family later received a call from RCMP saying the hospital wouldn't take her.

Loretta Noyes, a Calgary nurse, described how she called the psychiatric ward at the hospital and begged them to take her sister in after hearing that she had threatened the life of her own daughter.

"They took her to hospital and then released her. It was a very short time -- within two hours," she told the court.

Loretta Noyes was so concerned about her sister's mental state that she discussed the possibility of obtaining guardianship of her two children but that didn't come about.

The court has already heard that despite her well-documented history of mental illness, Noyes was not admitted to hospital on several occasions prior to Fulton's death.

Dr. Richard Magee has testified that when she was brought to the hospital in July 2009 -- a month before Fulton's death -- was in a "fragile situation" but he said there was not enough evidence to force her into hospital.

"It's fairly difficult to get into a hospital these days, so it must be a fairly acute case -- like suicidal," he said.

The trial is scheduled to continue Wednesday.