Muzzammil S. "Mo" Hassan today made it clear he intends to try to show at his murder trial that his wife was actually the "abuser" in their troubled marriage.

Hassan, now acting as his own attorney, also told Erie County Judge Thomas P. Franczyk that he may call the judge as a defense witness.

Hassan also handed the judge a list of proposed defense witnesses that included Dr. Ana Nastasha Cervantes. But after Hassan did so, Franczyk read a letter he received from that forensic psychiatric Monday stating she has no intention of testifying for Hassan.

Hassan responded that, since Cervantes wrote that letter to the judge, "things changed" and he still intends to call her as "an expert witness" on his behalf to bolster his claim that he suffered from abuse inflicted by his wife.

The former cable television executive has been jailed since he turned himself in at Orchard Park Police Headquarters about an hour after he told officers he had beheaded his wife, Aasiya Z. Hassan, 37, in their Thorn Road cable office.

As the nearly week-old prosecution case neared a conclusion, Hassan demanded the judge force prosecutors to turn over material he claims will be favorable to his defense. That evidence, he contended, is information the murder victim was actually killed by him in self-defense because of Aasiya's alleged physical and emotional abuse of him.

Hassan's claims prompted chief trial prosecutor Colleen Curtin Gable to tell the judge there is nothing in the written report of Dr. Gary Horwitz, the prosecution psychiatrist, that is favorable to Hassan's self-defense claims.

Hassan responded that various references in the Horwitz document to his late wife lying about how she suffered injuries in the years leading up to her death was evidence she was a spousal abuser.

But both the judge and prosecutor noted that Aasiya's misstatements about her injuries were actually efforts to protect Hassan from earlier criminal prosecutions.

"This case is more about who's the abuser, who's the victim," Hassan told the judge.

It is "crystal clear" Aasiya Hassan is the victim, Curtin Gable responded.

In the prospective defense witness list Hassan turned over to the judge today, he listed Franczyk, prosecutor Curtin Gable, Erie County District Attorney Frank A. Sedita III and Buffalo News reporter Sandra Tan as possible witnesses he will call to support his claims.

The judge questioned the feasibility of Hassan's claims. When the judge asked Hassan to disclose whether he will be presenting psychiatric evidence to support his claims of criminal innocence, Hassan told him he will disclose that when prosecutors rest their case.

Hassan also asked the judge this morning to order the sheriff's department to take him to court a little earlier than they have, so he can confer each morning with "my attorney," Jeremy D. Schwartz.

But Curtin Gable noted Hassan is now his own attorney.

The judge refused to order his earlier return to court each morning, telling Hassan that Schwartz, now acting as a court-approved legal adviser to Hassan, can go to the downtown lockup across Delaware Avenue from the courtroom to discuss strategy with him.

mgryta@buffnews.comnull