LITTLE ROCK – A man accused of killing a television anchorwoman is competent to stand trial, a judge ruled Thursday, setting the stage of a possible death penalty trial.

Pulaski County Circuit Judge Chris Piazza said Curtis Lavelle Vance showed he can assist in his own defense by filing his own motions and asking that his attorneys be removed. Piazza said it would be “almost ludicrous” to hold up Vance’s scheduled Sept. 9 trial for a monthlong stay at Arkansas State Hospital, which Vance’s lawyers requested after he refused to cooperate in a mental examination.

“I think he’s demonstrated through his own actions he’s fit to proceed in this case,” Piazza said.

Vance has pleaded not guilty to a capital murder charge in the October 2008 slaying of KATV Little Rock anchorwoman Anne Pressly. Pressly’s mother found her daughter severely beaten Oct. 20 after she missed a wake-up call at her Little Rock home. Pressly died at a hospital Oct. 25, having never regained consciousness.

A psychiatrist hired by the defense, Dr. Shawn Agharkar, testified that Vance’s mother beat his head repeatedly against a brick wall when he was 5 years old, and that he may have suffered brain damage as a result.

He also said Vance showed signs of paranoia during a two-and-a-half hour interview in March, in which Vance claimed there was a “conspiracy” to convict him of killing Pressly, a morning anchorwoman for Little Rock station.

“It has a very paranoid flavor to it,” Agharkar said. “It’s not rational.”

Agharkar said Vance’s mother, Jacqueline Burnett, also suffered from psychosis at one point. After the hearing, Burnett told reporters she had been addicted to crack cocaine since 1986 and that everything Agharkar “said was true.”

Katherine Streett, Vance’s lead attorney, argued her client needed further neurological and psychiatric examination as he might also be mentally disabled. A 2002 U.S. Supreme Court decision prevents states from executing the mentally disabled.

Deputy prosecutor John Johnson said interviews Vance gave with police detectives show he understood the charges against him.

“The responsibility is his,” Johnson said. “We cannot make him cooperate.”

Prosecutors haven’t said if they’ll seek the death penalty. If convicted of capital murder, state law allows only for a death sentence or life in prison.

Police announced in November that a DNA sample collected at the Pressly’s home matched a sample from an unsolved rape in Marianna, about 90 miles east of Little Rock. Detectives focused on Curtis Vance, who had allegedly been seen loitering around several homes that had been burglarized in the Mississippi Delta community.

Prosecutors say Vance has confessed three times to Pressly’s slaying since his arrest.