Wife Says Allergic Reaction Caused Bakker’s Collapse

BUTNER, N.C. —  Government psychiatrists Friday began evaluating PTL founder Jim Bakker to determine if he is competent to stand trial, but the evangelist’s wife said that his emotional collapse was only an allergic reaction to medicine.

Bakker, charged with fraud and conspiracy, was taken to the minimum security Federal Correctional Institute at Butner in handcuffs and leg irons on Thursday after his psychiatrist said he had been hallucinating.

Bakker’s wife, Tammy Faye, visited her husband for six hours Friday. She said later that Bakker had told her he had not faked his collapse to halt his trial. She said he was suffering from an allergic reaction to medicine.

“He just literally had more than he could handle,” she told reporters in front of the institute. She speculated that Xanax, an anti-depressant administered to him Wednesday night, may have caused the reaction.

On Thursday, a psychiatrist who has been treating Bakker for nine months told U.S. District Judge Robert Potter, presiding at Bakker’s trial, that Bakker was hallucinating and lying on the floor of his lawyer’s office in a fetal position.