Insanity Defense Essay

The Insanity Defense: Insane or Not The insanity defense is a topic that seems to garner a lot of public attention even though it is rarely used and is rarely successful. So why is this topic so popular considering its rarity? The answer could be a combination of highly publicized cases that use the insanity defense and the public’s misunderstanding of exactly what happens when someone is found not guilty by reason of insanity. The public has a common misconception that someone found not guilty by reason of insanity it just let go and not punished for his or her crimes, but in reality a person is almost always committed and often longer time than if the defendant had gone to prison
Discussion
Three Classification of Insanity Defense
The insanity defense is based on the perception that the person cannot be held accountable due to mental disease or disability, and this deprives them of the ability to make rational or voluntary choices. When dealing with the insanity defense, the guilty act is not usually in question, but it is whether or not the defendant knew the wrongfulness of his crime. One of the classifications of insanity is the M’Naghten rule, which came from a case where Englishmen Daniel M’Naghten killed the secretary of the Prime Minister because he thought the Prime Minister Robert Peel was leading a conspiracy against him (Wrightsman 2002). The M’Naghten rule has three factors: first, that there must be a mental illness present; second, the inability to know the nature and quality of the act; and third, is the knowing right from wrong (Huss 2009).Twenty-Six states have adopted this rule including Texas. Another classification is the Model Penal Code, in 1962 the American Law Institute came up with a slightly different standard from the M’Naghten rule. The Model Penal Code states: a person is not responsible for it, conduct if at the time of such conduct as a result of mental disease or defect he lacks the substantial capacity either to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct or to confirm his conduct to requirements of the law (Huss 2009). Twenty-One states use this code. But four states had decided to abolish the insanity defense altogether. The states are Utah, Montana, Kansas, and Idaho. But, they actually still do use some type of insanity defense. But instead of getting a psychiatric test, the final verdict plea is called guilty by means of insanity. Which is just another fancy name of guilty.
Highly Publicized Case
One of the most publicized case in Texas dealing with the insanity defense was with Andrea Yates.
Yates was a mother of five children, who also had a history of mental illness and psychiatric hospitalization. In March 2000 she drowned her five children, one by one, in the bathtub. Yates suffered from postpartum psychosis. Postpartum psychosis is in some susceptible women, dramatic hormonal changes in childbirth and shortly afterward can result in a form of brief psychotic disorder (Fundukian and Wilson 2008). She was first found guilty of first-degree murder and was sentenced to life in prison but was awarded an appeal based because expert witness had made an inaccurate statement while testifying. In the second trial Yates was found not guilty by reason of insanity and is now in a mental institution where she is likely to spend the rest of her
life.
Common Misconceptions
There are many misconceptions with the insanity defense and some are that only one percent of trials that try to use the insanity defense hold up. When an insanity defense is being used, it means the defendant admits committing to criminal behavior as now seeking a not guilty verdict on the base of his state of mind. If the jury does not agree, the defendant will be convicted, and generally will serve a longer sentence then will someone convicted of saying crime it is not plead insanity. Some disbelieve in the insanity defense because they believe people should be held accountable for their crime no matter their state of mind. Some of the public believe that the insanity defense is only for murder charges, but almost 2/3 of insanity pleas are for crimes other than murder ranging from assault to shoplifting. In the past year only 14 cases have tried to use the insanity defense, but none have been successful when the verdict was announced. Some people believe that the insanity defense should not be used and there are some that without the insanity defense it would be morally inhuman due to their mental capability.
Conclusion
Between the highly publicize cases and the public’s misconception about the insanity defense this debate produces a lot of interest.
Insanity defense is not there to get criminals off of the criminal charge, but is there to protect the mentally ill. The defense is there to help the people whose minds are not right. It is there so that if a mentally ill person commits a crime they will be able to get the right psychiatric help and for the psychiatric doctors to understand to further help people in the future. This is a topic that has many of great debates and will be debated further until all Americans actually know what the insanity defense
is.

References
Fundukian, L. J., & Wilson, J. (2008). The Gale encyclopedia of mental health. Detroit, MI: Thomson Gale.
Huss, M. T. (2009). Forensic psychology: Research, clinical practice, and applications. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.
Wrightsman, L. S. (2002). Psychology and the legal system. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Thomson Learning.