NONFICTION ARTICLES 1 â Insanity Defense
Transcription
NONFICTION ARTICLES 1 â Insanity Defense
NONFICTION ARTICLES 1 – Insanity Defense Directions: Read the following article. Use your active reading strategies. Annotate by coding the text and making comments to explain your coding or thoughts in the space provided (with a colored pen). LEGAL DICTIONARY Annotate and comment about the text in this The insanity defense is a defense asserted by an accused in a criminal prosecution to avoid liability for the commission of a crime because, at the time of the crime, the person did not appreciate the nature or quality or space below: Insanity Defense – Passage 1 wrongfulness of the acts. The insanity defense is used by criminal defendants. The most common variation is cognitive insanity. Under the test for cognitive insanity, a defendant must have been so impaired by a mental disease or defect at the time of the act that he or she did not know the nature or quality of the act, or, if the defendant did know the nature or quality of the act, he or she did not know that the act was wrong. The vast majority of states allow criminal defendants to invoke the cognitive insanity defense. Another form of the insanity defense is volitional insanity, or Irresistible Impulse. A defense of irresistible impulse asserts that the defendant, although able to distinguish right from wrong at the time of the act, suffered from a mental disease or defect that made him or her incapable of controlling her or his actions. This defense is common in crimes of vengeance. For example, suppose that a child has been brutally assaulted. If an otherwise conscientious and law-abiding mother shoots the perpetrator, the mother may argue that she was so enraged that she became mentally ill and incapable of exerting self-control. Very few states allow the volitional insanity defense. The insanity defense should not be confused with Incompetency. Persons who are incompetent to stand trial are held in a mental institution until they are considered capable of participating in the proceedings. The insanity defense reflects the generally accepted notion that persons who cannot appreciate the consequences of their actions should not be punished for criminal acts. Most states regulate the defense with statutes, but a few states allow the courts to craft the rules for its proper use. Generally, the defense is available to a criminal defendant if the judge instructs the jury that it may consider whether the defendant was insane when the crime was committed. The judge may issue this instruction if the defendant has produced sufficient evidence at trial to justify the theory. Sufficient evidence invariably includes Expert Testimony by psychologists and psychiatrists. When invoking insanity as a defense, a defendant is required to notify the prosecution. In some states, sanity is determined by the judge or jury in a separate proceeding following the determination of guilt or innocence at trial. In other states, the defense is either accepted or rejected in the verdict of the judge or jury. Even if evidence of insanity does not win a verdict of not guilty, the sentencing court may consider it as a mitigating factor. History "Complete madness" was first established as a defense to criminal charges by the common-law courts in latethirteenth-century England. By the eighteenth century, the complete madness definition had evolved into the "wild beast" test. Under that test, the insanity defense was available to a person who was "totally deprived of his understanding and memory so as not to know what he [was] doing, no more than an infant, a brute, or a wild beast" (Feigl 1995, 161). http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Insanity+Defense WORLD BOOK Insanity Defense – Passage 2 Insanity is a legal term for any mental disease or defect severe enough to prevent someone from being legally responsible for his or her actions. Under many systems of criminal law, someone found to be insane cannot be guilty of a crime. Thus, insanity is used as a defense in some criminal cases. However, a defendant found not guilty by reason of insanity may still be considered dangerous. Such a defendant could not be imprisoned but could be hospitalized until he or she was no longer mentally ill. The insanity defense focuses on the defendant’s state of mind at the time of the crime. This is different from incompetency to stand trial. Incompetency focuses on the defendant’s state of mind at the time of trial. A defense of diminished capacity permits a defendant to introduce evidence showing that he or she lacked the mental state of intention necessary to be convicted of a crime. In early English history, people who were thought to be insane were not prosecuted for criminal behavior. Instead, they were committed to asylums. Eventually, a standard was required to determine when someone was or was not insane to determine whether to prosecute. The landmark case in the modern development of the insanity defense is M'Naghten's Case. This case was decided in the United Kingdom in 1843. Daniel M'Naghten had been charged with murder. The court judged him not guilty by reason of insanity. Doctors who examined M'Naghten found that he was prevented from being responsible for his actions by a mental illness. The case led to a new standard for the insanity defense called the M'Naghten Rule. This rule recognized a defendant as insane if, at the time the defendant committed the act, he or she met certain conditions. The conditions were that the defendant either did not know the nature and quality of the act or did not know what he or she was doing was wrong. British law and a large number of U.S. states still use some form of the M'Naghten Rule. More legal tests have been added for the insanity defense since M'Naghten. If a defendant is acquitted because of insanity, the court gives a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity. All states have procedures for committing a defendant to a psychiatric institution following such a verdict. Some states also allow a defendant to be found guilty but mentally ill. This verdict allows for conviction, but it also requires treatment as part of the sentence. Contributor: • Steven R. Probst, J.D., M.L.I.S., Educational Services Librarian, Valparaiso University School of Law.