Woman Is Ruled Incompetent in Murder Case : Courts: Judge orders Victoria Madeira, who is accused of killing her mother, to be sent to a mental facility. She could be tried at a later date.

An Anaheim woman is mentally incompetent to stand trial on charges that she murdered her 78-year-old mother in La Canada Flintridge, a Superior Court judge ruled last week.

Judge Paul Boland ordered that Victoria Jacobs Madeira, 43, be transferred to a state mental health facility for evaluation and treatment until she is competent to stand trial. Madeira has been jailed at the Sybil Brand Institute for Women since her arrest last Oct. 14 outside the home of her mother, Roma Jaul Jacobs.

Investigators said Madeira and her 11-year-old son, armed with knives and handguns, took a taxi from Anaheim to La Canada Flintridge. At the house, Madeira stabbed her mother, then shot her while the older woman was pleading for help on the telephone with sheriff’s deputies, authorities said. Deputies responding to the call found Madeira wearing military fatigues and her son attired in women’s clothing.

In January, a Juvenile Court judge heard testimony regarding the boy’s involvement in the slaying, then dismissed charges against him.

But Madeira was ordered to appear March 28 at a competency hearing in Pasadena Superior Court. At the hearing, Boland ruled that Madeira was incapable of assisting in her own defense, Deputy Dist. Atty. Michael Patrick Stewart said.

Her mental condition had been evaluated by two court-appointed experts, but the judge ordered the reports sealed. His ruling referred to her present mental state, not her condition at the time of the slaying, Stewart said.

If she is determined to be competent at a later time, she will be returned to court to stand trial, the prosecutor said. A report on her progress must be given to the judge within 90 days.

Members of Madeira’s family have said the woman has a long history of mental problems, but that they had been unable to persuade authorities to institutionalize her.