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(AP) - To Thomas Edwin Hargreaves, the threat to kill Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear amounted to overheated rhetoric while complaining about losing a commercial driver's license.

To the FBI, the comment came across as a serious threat. To Hargreaves' attorney, it is a sign of the man's mental illness.

Lexington attorney Robin Cornette wants Hargreaves, a 44-year-old from Liverpool Township, Ohio, to undergo competency tests and introduce evidence of insanity or mental defect should his case go to trial.

A federal grand jury in Lexington charged Hargreaves in August with sending Beshear a message over the Internet saying, "I AM GOING TO KILL YOU ... WATCH YOUR BACK PIG!" He has pleaded not guilty.

Kerri Richardson, a spokeswoman for Beshear, said the office doesn't comment on matters involving the governor's security. Cornette did not immediately return a message seeking comment Tuesday.

According to federal prosecutors, Hargreaves sent an Internet message to Beshear containing the threat. Federal investigators raided Hargreaves' home and arrested him in September. Since then, he's been held in the Grayson County Detention Center in Leitchfield, awaiting trial.

Hargreaves has written five letters to the federal court clerk in Lexington asking that the case be dismissed. In one of the letters, all of which were included in court filings, Hargreaves notes that three weeks passed between the message to Beshear and his arrest. That's proof, Hargreaves wrote, that "neither party beleaved that myself was a threat to the governor, nor did either party beleave that the statement in question was a credible threat."

In another letter, Hargreaves wrote that, because his lawyer was court appointed, "I have been denied a non-bias attorney who is not financially connected to or affiliated with the United States Federal Government, who in fact is the party prosecuting myself."

In his last letter to the court, dated Nov. 28, Hargreaves details prior criminal proceedings in Florida before writing about losing a commercial driver's license in Kentucky because, in his words, he couldn't afford to pay for a physical to have the license renewed. Hargreaves also described Beshear's response to his plight as "cold" and wrote off the threat as a "Metaphoric statement that went wrong."

"I droped the ball but the statement is not a threat of bodily harm, I am not a criminal and me and my family should not be put through the crap we are now receiving," Hargreaves wrote. "I should not be in jail."

In a motion filed Friday, Cornette noted that Hargreaves has a history of mental illness and has likely deteriorated mentally while incarcerated. Cornette said Hargreaves' letters show a lack of comprehension of the court process.

"Mr. Hargreaves has not always exhibited coherent, rational thought processes, making it difficult if not impossible at times to gain his assistance in the preparation of his case," Cornette wrote.

Prosecutors did not immediately respond to Cornette's motion. U.S. District Judge Danny C. Reeves had not ruled on Cornette's request for a competency hearing as of Monday.

(Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.)