SALEM — An Oregon death-row inmate who wants to waive his appeals overcame a key legal hurdle Tuesday as a judge found him competent to assist his lawyers and understand the consequences of his request to be executed.

The judge did not go so far as to formally rule that twice-convicted murderer Gary Haugen is competent to be executed, however, and he did not issue a death warrant, which would authorize a lethal injection. Marion County Circuit Court Judge Joseph Guimond will make that decision at a future hearing after asking Haugen a series of questions required as part of the legal process.

If Haugen gets his way, his execution would be Oregon’s first in 14 years.

The judge relied Tuesday on a report and testimony by Portland psychologist Richard Hulteng, who found that Haugen has an average intelligence and a personality disorder but is not currently suffering from a mental condition that would impair his ability to make reasoned legal decisions.

“He was aware that it would end his life, it would end his appeals,” Hulteng said of Haugen’s request to be executed. “He’s hopeful that it may have some impact on the system. Maybe a little grandiose about that but not delusional.”

Haugen has complained for years in letters to court officials that the criminal justice system is arbitrary, vindictive and broken.

Haugen told the psychologist that he first drank alcohol when he was 11, first used marijuana in sixth grade and later used drugs, including methamphetamine, heroin and LSD. He also said he was first arrested at age 13, for stealing from a grocery store.

Haugen and another prisoner were sentenced to death in 2007 for the murder four years earlier of David Polin, a fellow inmate who suffered 84 stab wounds and a crushed skull. Haugen and accomplice Jason Brumwell killed Polin because they mistakenly believed he snitched to corrections officers about their use of drugs, authorities said.

At the time of Polin’s murder, Haugen was in prison for the 1981 murder of a former girlfriend’s mother.