New details in Dartmouth professor slayings may jeopardize teen's insanity defense

<br>HANOVER, N.H. (AP) _ Lawyers for a teen-ager accused of killing two Dartmouth College professors will have trouble showing their client was insane if details released about a robbery-murder plot are

Wednesday, February 20th 2002, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

HANOVER, N.H. (AP) _ Lawyers for a teen-ager accused of killing two Dartmouth College professors will have trouble showing their client was insane if details released about a robbery-murder plot are true, a legal expert said.

According to a new indictment unsealed Tuesday, in the six months leading up to the slayings of Half and Susanne Zantop, Robert Tulloch and James Parker went to four other homes planning to talk their way in, steal the residents' ATM cards and kill them.

The teens succeeded at their fifth target _ the Zantop home _ by posing as students conducting an environmental survey, the indictment says.

``I think you can expect that the state will argue this course of conduct negates any claim of insanity,'' said Michael Ramsdell, a former state homicide prosecutor now in private practice.

Tulloch, 18, is charged with first-degree murder, which carries an automatic life sentence without parole. He has indicated he will use an insanity defense at his trial, scheduled to start in April.

A lawyer for Tulloch could not be reached for comment Tuesday, the anniversary of the suspects' arrest at an Indiana truck stop.

Parker, 17, has pleaded guilty to reduced charges and has agreed to testify against Tulloch. Former prosecutors said he clearly was the source of the new information.

The new indictment, the third issued against Tulloch, says the teens' four previous robbery attempts failed because no one was home or the people who came to the door would not let them in.

It says their last failed attempt was at a home close to the Zantops' the same day they were murdered.

Audrey McCollum said prosecutors called Tuesday morning to tell her that home probably was hers.

``The possibility that the apparent murderers came to our house is terrifying,'' she said.

Prosecutors declined to elaborate on Tuesday's murder-conspiracy indictment, which for the first time lays out a clear motive for the killings. In December, authorities said the slayings took place during a robbery, but they gave no details.

In the months after the murders, townspeople and the news media had offered a host of theories _ a thrill-killing, revenge for some kind of slight, even neo-Nazi hatred. The Zantops, ages 62 and 55, were from Germany and felt their native country had not done enough to atone for the Holocaust.

Both teen-agers are from well-respected families, and Tulloch was an honors student in Chelsea, Vt., population 1,300. The indictment says the pair came up with the robbery-murder plan in June 2000, seven months before the Jan. 27, 2001, murders.

The indictment says Half Zantop, who taught Earth sciences, opened the door to the pair and led them to the study. There, Tulloch allegedly asked questions and Parker took notes. The indictment does not describe the stabbings.

Afterward, the teens allegedly drove off, but headed back to the Zantop home to retrieve the sheaths belonging to their distinctive knives. They turned back when they saw a police car in the driveway.

Prosecutors said fingerprints on the sheaths and bloody footprints tied both Tulloch and Parker to the crime.

Dartmouth biology professor Edward Berger, a close friend of the Zantops, said it was painful to hear the details in the new indictment.

``These kids are obviously very skilled at deception,'' he said.