Cadwiz

I was just reading Mr.Mephisto's thread about the stabbed 8yr old boy. Someone posted something about insanity, and that got me thinking. I know that proving insanity in the courtroom is a little harder than shown on TV. I personally believe that most murders are committed by people that are insane. Would a sane person kill someone, other than self-defense?
Anyway, would you want to be sitting next to this guy on the the bus when he loses control again? What I am asking is, do you believe the insanity defense should equal not guilty? I think it should only be used as a mitigating factor in the penalty phase of the trial.

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warrrreagl

I believe the insanity defense is a remnant of the notion that people can be successfully rehabilitated. The reality has, unfortunately, strayed afar.

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Charlatan

Insanity doesn't mean you aren't guilty is just means that the "punishment" or sentance will take a different tone.

A sane and guilty person goes to jail or death row.
An insane and guilty person goes to the insane asylum.

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maleficent

There's insanity, when a person truely doesn't know what they are doing is wrong, and there's the Twinkie Defense version of insanity, which is more a legal trick than anything else.

In so many cases, insanity pleas seem to absolve a person from responsibility, especially 'temporary insanity' cases, or heat of the moment, that the person is normally a rational human being but something set them over the edge for that moment. That I don't buy, I have a temper, but I have never lost control of my temper to the point where I wasn't aware of what I was doing.

A person is either guilty or not guilty. Extenuating circumstances may have them be insane, but it doesn't make them any less guilty.

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portereight

"A person is either guilty or not guilty"
That's the point of being found not guilty by reason of insanity. It doesn't mean you didn't participate in the act for which you are charged. It means that you were not responsible (in the real sense of the word).
I believe here in Canada, once found not guilty by reason of insanity you will be remanded into custody of the criminal psychiatric system for an indefinite period of time. This period may and often does exceed the length of the original potential sentence.

soloist124

i truly believe that this should not be a reason to be not guiilty. People STILL have a motive and reason to do something so bad to someone else, they deserve to be punished for it, no matter what.

Redlemon

What if it were a chemical imbalance that resulted in the person committing a murder, and drug treatment would successfully cure the person?

MSD

If you do something, you accept full responsibility for that action. If you're so out of it that you didn't know you did it (or didn't do it willingly) you have no place in society anyway. Life in prison where you get ass raped in the shower isn't much better or worse than life in an institution where they shoot you full of thorazine and throw you in a quiet room every time you raise your voice.

william

Insanity is a very hard case to prove. There are few cases when it should actually be used. That said - lawyers will use it because that is part of their job - to free their clients.
If your guilty of murder, either legally insane or not, your ass should do a life sentence (or the death penalty - depending on where you live).
For those that are against the death penalty - why spend 10s of thousands (a year) to keep him/her alive?

Redlemon

That's a whole different thread, can we skip it for this thread?

djflish

I don't think it should matter. Insane or not, they still commited murder and should be punished.

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Suave

Insanity is not an excuse. It is still the person who has committed the act. They weren't forced to do it by a demon or anything like that. I believe the medicalization of people who do not fit into the "normal" range of mental activity has done no good for us as a society. If someone kills their husband in a fit of rage, then they're considered a bad person with lack of willpower. If someone kills their husband because the voices told them to, they're ill, and need our pity and treatment. Suuuuuuure. Psychologically abnormal people are people too, and should be tried in court as any regular person would. Regardless of the exact causes, they've committed a crime, and are a danger to society.

avhg1

Isn't everyone insane? Oh wait, that was just the voices telling me it was everyone else.

Guilty or not guilty, that's it. Either you did it or didn't do it. The reasoning behind the action doesn't change the action. The only thing that one’s mentality should decide is the consequences of those actions. I say that for things like murder, there is no rehabilitation and those people, sane or not, do not get freedom ever.

animosity

Like everyone else is stating, sane or not, you do the crime you pay the fine. In the case of murder I dont care where they go, so long as it is not pleasent and it is for life.

Redlemon

Am I the only one here who considers mental insanity, especially due to chemical imbalance, a treatable issue?

I shouldn't be surprised, I think I was also the only holdout on that mom with postpartum depression who killed her children.

KinkyKiwi

same here..altho i have to admit i've gotten to a point of such extreme anger that i've actually considered killing them. never went thru with it and knew fully what i was doing. and on a slightly differnt note...lets say a woman is raped...then later she kills him..is she insane, gulity or "right"?

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radioguy

i don't think that insanity should be a cause for being found not guilty. if you do it, you're guilty. if people think that insanity caused them to do it then why can't they be found guilty because of insanity and get help? i don't like the excuse. you did it, you're guilty.

KnifeMissile

You people who don't think that insanity is a valid defense are all insane!

In all seriousness, people who don't feel that insanity can excuse your actions are not thinking about the situation objectively. Here are some hypothetical situations to help you challenge your own convictions on the subject.

Suppose someone slips you a drug as a practical joke. While you weren't looking, they snuck a drop of some psychotropic drug into your drink and then watch the hilarity ensue. Next thing you know, you just killed someone because you were defending yourself from a dangerous demon. Are you guilty? I mean, you did kill someone, after all. There's no denying that...

Another situation is if you were a waiter serving a drink in a restaurant. Some accident in the kitchen happened and a container of some beverage was accidentally poisoned. So, you serve a drink to a customer and they die as a result. Are you guilty of murder? You did kill someone, after all.

The answer to both these questions is obviously no. The question is "why?" Why aren't they guilty? They did kill in both cases, after all... They're not guilty because intent is important when assigning responsibility. No one intended to kill anyone in both these cases, so there can be no guilt.

Insanity is very similar, particularly to the first example. The insane person doesn't know what they are doing, by definition, so how can they be guilty? Despite what some might think, if someone is criminally insane, they aren't just let free because they're found not guilty. Depending on the situation, they can be sent to a psychiatric institution and are let free only until a doctor (or doctors) decides that they are no longer a danger to society, if that ever happens! This can be worse than prison (or better, depending on what they can do for you). This all depends on the particular situation of the case.

Actually, I had more to say than I thought I would. If I knew I was going to go on this long, I would simply have talked about the role of criminal incarceration. A lot of this can be understood by examining the actual goals for criminal imprisonment. Why do we put criminals in jail? Why do we ever let them go? What's the point of all this? Stuff like that...

antisuck

In each of these examples, there exists a clearly identifiable resposible party. Who is responsible in the case of insanity? I'm sure you're not suggesting that insanity is typically the result of a mixup in the kitchen or a practical joke.

In fact it is the issue of responsibility that is central to the disposition of criminal cases involving defendants who may or may not be insane. And the question of who exactly is responsible - the crazy person him or herself? society? God or mother nature? the abusive stepfather? - that makes these discussions so interesting and the answers so subjective.

KnifeMissile

Yes, in my examples, there is someone who can take responsibility for the death but, even then, it's not clear how much they are to blame. In both cases, it's unlikely that the guilty party had meant to kill anyone so do you charge them with murder? What can you charge them with?

I also fail to see how any of that is relevant. In the event of insanity, there is no one to take responsibility, any more than there would be if lightning had killed a person...

aktornado

It should keep someone from getting the death penalty, but that's about it.

KinkyKiwi

wouldnt that be manslaughter?

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Some mornings, it's just not worth chewing through the leather straps.
Play with each other. Play with yourselves. Just don't play with the squirrels, they bite.