“Has jail been good for D.J.?” attorney Bryan Hershman asked Daniel Mustard’s father at Kitsap County Superior Court on Tuesday.

“Good for D.J.,” Dan Mustard answered, choking up. “Bad for the family, but good for D.J.”

Daniel Mustard, nicknamed D.J., has been in the Kitsap County Jail since he was arrested and accused of murdering his neighbor, 87-year-old Ruby Andrews, in her Manchester home on April 5, 2009.

In the weeks before and after the murder, the younger Mustard — whose lawyers are pleading insanity — had acted strangely, according to testimony from his father, Dan.

For example, he didn’t want to sleep in his room because he’d had nightmares and felt afraid there.

D.J. also felt a huge sense of entitlement, according to Dan Mustard.

At the beginning of his time in jail, for example, Mustard expected his parents to simply give him money.

But more recently, he seemed more thankful for their gifts.

Before he went to jail, Dan Mustard said had a difficult time convincing his son to pray with him.

“Now, he brags about his religious leadership in the jailhouse,” Dan Mustard said.

“This young man is my son,” pointing to “D.J.” and indicating that the Daniel Mustard of April 5 wasn’t the son he knew and loved.

Daniel Mustard has spoken frequently to his girlfriend, who asked not to be named, while in jail, and lawyers played some of the tapes of those conversations on Monday in court.

At one point, Mustard said he’d started talking to himself since he has been incarcerated.

“You’ve always talked to yourself,” his girlfriend said with a laugh.

“It’s different,” Mustard said, explaining that now he was replying to the “voices” in his head.

He also said that “something” came to him in jail and told him he needed to get bailed out and that it would make his family stronger if his parents posted his bail.

His girlfriend told him that he probably wouldn’t get out since his bail was set at $1 million, and his parents couldn’t afford to pay even 10 percent of that.

Mustard’s girlfriend told him his family already planned to sell their house just to pay for his legal fees, which could cost $100,000.

But, according to Dan Mustard, that was a lie they told to D.J. so he wouldn’t be upset with them.

At several points in Daniel Mustard’s conversations with his girlfriend, he implied he had committed the murder.

She told him repeatedly that it couldn’t be true, and he’d just convinced himself that he’d done it.

Mustard told her he worried the other inmates might kill him, and he feared he might kill someone else during his stay in jail.

However, he befriended one inmate, David L. Transue, when he discovered he knew Transue’s children from John Sedgwick Junior High, which they attended together a few years before.

Transue testified against Mustard on Monday morning in a plea agreement with several conditions, including a reduced sentence for himself.

Transue said that Mustard had described the murder to him in detail and asked for advice about what to do next.

He said Mustard planned to steal pharmaceutical drugs from Andrews, but had not planned to kill her.