Is it true that mental illness is considered a defense in criminal court?

Question

That's what I heard, but lately, I've been hearing that people can't use that as a defense anymore.

Answer 1

There is still grounds for this defense, commonly known as pleading "Not guilty by reason of insanity" These pleas are not used as often as TV would make you think as they are extremely hard to prove. First of all you must plead insanity from the beginning or not at all. In other words if the trial is not going your way, you can not suddenly claim insanity. Then you will be set for a Psych hearing by the state, surprisingly they do not take the word of the defense attorney's doctors.

In the Psych exam the standard most commonly used is the "McNaughton Rule" based off of a case from England in the 1800's.

The McNaughton rule -- not knowing right from wrong
The first famous legal test for insanity came in 1843, in the McNaughton case. Englishman Daniel McNaughton shot and killed the secretary of the British Prime Minister, believing that the Prime Minister was conspiring against him. The court acquitted McNaughton "by reason of insanity," and he was placed in a mental institution for the rest of his life. However, the case caused a public uproar, and Queen Victoria ordered the court to develop a stricter test for insanity.
The "McNaughton rule" was a standard to be applied by the jury, after hearing medical testimony from prosecution and defense experts. The rule created a presumption of sanity, unless the defense proved "at the time of committing the act, the accused was laboring under such a defect of reason, from disease of the mind, as not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing or, if he did know it, that he did not know what he was doing was wrong."

The McNaughton rule became the standard for insanity in the United States and the United Kingdom, and is still the standard for insanity in almost half of the states.

What this is basically saying is you have to prove that the defendant did not know right from wrong at the time of the crime. In other words you would have to prove that the defendant did not know it is wrong to kill someone. Not a very easy thing to do.

Answer 2

1

Answer 3

It depends upon the state in which the crime was committed. Each states has different laws on using mental illness as a defense. I person (in many states) can be found guilty but mentally ill; which really doesn't change things as far as the sentence.

It is hard to prove that "at the time of the crime," the person literally did not know right from wrong.

Answer 4

It is still defense in most jurisdictions -- but it is far more limited (and rarely successful) than mot people think.

Basically, certain mental illnesses are considered to cause the person to be unable to form the mental intent required for certain crimes -- and since the person did not have the mental state required, they could not have committed that crime because a required element is missing.

However, even where mental illness is used as a defense, the person is usually committed to psychiatric care, not just released.

Answer 5

Yes, it can be used, but the person and their lawyer, and the doctors will have a to prove it very strongly.

It's not as easy to claim mental illness in court as it used to be, and while the punishment is still about the same(the person will have to spend time in a mental institution and may be released after years of care and drugs), it's very hard to have a judge declare someone mentally incapable of standing trial for a crime.

Answer 6

In CA we're still using it... it's called a Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity defense. Very tough to win, though... and the defendant gets put into an institution until they no longer present a danger to the community.

Answer 7

It is a defense, however, the nature of that defense varies from state to state depending on whether the state has adopted the M'Naughten Rule, a modified M'Naughten Rule, or the a different rule.

The M'Naghten Rules (1843) 10 C & F 200, state, inter alia, that a person may be "insane" if "...at the time of the committing of the act, the party accused was laboring under such a defect of reason, arising from a disease of the mind, as not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing, or, if he did know it, that he did not know what he was doing was wrong."

There is also an idea of an irresistible impulse, which argues that a person may have known an act was illegal; but, because of a mental impairment, they couldn't control their actions. In 1994, Lorena Bobbitt was found not guilty of the felony of "malicious wounding" (the equivalent of mayhem), when her defense argued that an irresistible impulse led her to cut off her husband's penis. In the late nineteenth century some states and federal courts in the United States, dissatisfied with the M'Naughten rule, adopted the irresistible impulse test.

The Durham rule or "product test" was set forth by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 1954 and states that "... an accused is not criminally responsible if his unlawful act was the product of mental disease or defect". After the 1970s, US jurisdictions have tended not to recognize this argument as it places emphasis on "mental disease or defect" and thus on testimony by psychiatrists and is argued to be somewhat ambiguous.

The Brawner Rule, from the case of United States v. Brawner, 471 F.2d 969 (1972) by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit set aside the Durham ruling arguing the ruling’s requirement that a crime must be a “product of mental disease or defect” placed the question guilt on expert witnesses and diminished the jury’s role in determining guilt. Under this proposal, juries are allowed to decide the "insanity question" as they see fit. Basing its ruling on the American Law Institute’s (ALI) Model Penal Code, the court ruled that for a defendant not to be criminally guilty for a crime the defendant, “(i) lacks substantial capacity to appreciate that his conduct is wrongful, or (ii) lacks substantial capacity to conform his conduct to the law.”

There was widespread public outcry over John Hinckley Jr.'s successful use of the insanity defense in his trial for the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan. The Insanity Defense Reform Act of 1984, enacted by Congress in 1984 in response to the verdict in the Hinckley trial, and codified at Title 18, U.S. Code, Section 17, states that a person accused of a crime can be judged not guilty by reason of insanity if "the defendant, as a result of a severe mental disease or defect, was unable to appreciate the nature and quality or the wrongfulness of his acts."

The substantial capacity test was defined by the American Law Institute, in its Model Penal Code. This argues that insanity should be defined as a lack of substantial capacity to control one's behavior. Substantial capacity is defined as: "the mental capacity needed to understand the wrongfulness of [an] act, or to conform...behavior to the...law." This is related to the M'Naghten Rule and the idea of 'irresistible impulse'.

The notion of temporary insanity argues that a defendant was insane, but is now sane. A defendant found to have been temporarily insane will often be released without any requirements of psychiatric treatment.

Media coverage in the United States tends to dictate how situations are perceived by the public. A case using the insanity defense usually receives a lot more media attention because it is considered unusual or dramatic. The increased media coverage gives the impression that the insanity defense is used a lot, but this is not the case. In fact, according to an eight-state study the insanity defense is used in less than 1 percent of all court cases and was only successful in 26 percent of cases. Of those cases that were successful, 90 percent of offenders had been previously diagnosed.

Answer 8

It's called Not Guilty by reason of insanity.
That doesn't mean they get off either. They just do their jail time in a Criminal mental Institution which is far worse than prison so they think they get off but they don't.

Answer 9

i believe so, but you they first need to prove that and that is not so easy. Plus , then you most likely get locked up in the loony bin.

Answer 10

this is why a smart criminal keeps a head doctor on his or her payroll, it can pay off big time.