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Justice and the Insanity Defense.

Authors :
Gross, Hyman
Source :
Annals of the American Academy of Political & Social Science; Jan85, Vol. 477, p96-103, 8p
Publication Year :
1985

Abstract

Making insane persons liable for their criminal acts may be unjust. There are two reasons for this. If such persons are handicapped by mental illness in a way that deprives them of the ability to abide by the law, they enjoy the same excuse as anyone else who is helpless, and recognition of the excuse is a requirement of justice. Furthermore, the suffering inevitably produced by making a person liable to criminal punishment turns out to be unjustifiable in such a case, since in these circumstances the punishment is unnecessary. The injustice of punishing such persons must not be confused, however, with the injustice of holding liable a person whose act was without those mental elements required under the law for a particular crime. Conceived broadly, there are four varieties of disability that matter for a defense of insanity, and for policy reasons there must be some definite pathology to account for their presence if they are to be acceptable as the basis of a defense of insanity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
00027162
Volume :
477
Database :
Complementary Index
Journal :
Annals of the American Academy of Political & Social Science
Publication Type :
Academic Journal
Accession number :
24366365
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1177/0002716285477001009