3 ms·

Psychopathy is not a valid insanity plea. Killing someone and feeling good or nothing is inequivalent to not comprehending your own actions.

perl4ever 6y ago
Of course your first sentence is correct, I assume. But...you're saying feeling bad is not a type of comprehension? That is, empathy is not comprehension?
- filleduchaos 6y ago
  Empathy is a possible consequence of comprehension, not comprehension, yes
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- pdonis 6y ago
  > empathy is not comprehension? Not in the sense in which the law requires you to comprehend the consequences of your actions. An insane person could feel bad after killing someone because they respond with empathy after the fact, but still not have comprehended before the fact that what they were doing was going to kill someone. The latter, if established beyond a reasonable doubt, would mean they would not meet the legal comprehension requirement. And, conversely, a psychopath could comprehend perfectly well before the fact that what they were doing was going to kill someone, but feel nothing because they don't care. They would still meet the legal requirement for comprehension. (Disclaimer: IANAL.)
  - perl4ever 6y ago
    I think you're implying that somehow one has comprehension only before, and empathy only after. Why can't you have either in either order?
    - pdonis 6y ago
      > I think you're implying that somehow one has comprehension only before, and empathy only after. No, I'm just saying that to establish legal comprehension, you can't look at empathy, because they're two different things. They might go together--in normal, sane people they almost always will go together, both before and after--but you can't rely on it, since the people you are going to ask the question about in the first place--the people for whom you might have to evaluate a possible insanity defense--are precisely the people in whom you can't rely on them going together.
- filmgirlcw 6y ago
  In the US, the insanity defense is almost never used because it is so rarely successful and because the statutes are so high (especially since laws were passed in 1984 in response to the acquittal of John Hinckley, the man that shot President Reagan. He was committed to a psychiatric hospital instead and was released in 2016 (though there are strict rules around his release)). The Andrea Yates case [1], was the last time I can remember it being argued in a high profile case. This was the woman that drowned her five children. She was convicted in her first trial (though the jury refused to give her the death penalty) and that was overturned a few years later, after one of the prosecution’s psychiatrist admitted to giving materially false testimony. She was found not-guilty by reason of insanity in the retrial and confined to a state mental health facility. The Yates case is a good example of how high the burden of proof of an insanity defense is in a murder case. No one on either side disputed that she was severely mentally ill at the time of the killings. The state’s argument was that despite that, she knew the difference between and wrong enough to be legally responsible. There was a whole bunch of stuff in that case too — and it is truly tragic situation for everyone involved (there were reports that after Yates was properly medicated in prison awaiting trial and found out/remembered what she did, she became highly suicidal/went into shock), and there is an argument to be made that she was not given the proper care by her doctors leading up to the murders - but my point is more to say, in what as an outsider, appears to be a textbook case for successfully using the insanity defense, it was still unsuccessful until appeal and retrial, in part because of the question of comprehension. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Yates https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Yates

perl4ever 6y ago

Of course your first sentence is correct, I assume. But...you're saying feeling bad is not a type of comprehension? That is, empathy is not comprehension?

filleduchaos 6y ago
Empathy is a possible consequence of comprehension, not comprehension, yes
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
pdonis 6y ago
> empathy is not comprehension? Not in the sense in which the law requires you to comprehend the consequences of your actions. An insane person could feel bad after killing someone because they respond with empathy after the fact, but still not have comprehended before the fact that what they were doing was going to kill someone. The latter, if established beyond a reasonable doubt, would mean they would not meet the legal comprehension requirement. And, conversely, a psychopath could comprehend perfectly well before the fact that what they were doing was going to kill someone, but feel nothing because they don't care. They would still meet the legal requirement for comprehension. (Disclaimer: IANAL.)
- perl4ever 6y ago
  I think you're implying that somehow one has comprehension only before, and empathy only after. Why can't you have either in either order?
  - pdonis 6y ago
    > I think you're implying that somehow one has comprehension only before, and empathy only after. No, I'm just saying that to establish legal comprehension, you can't look at empathy, because they're two different things. They might go together--in normal, sane people they almost always will go together, both before and after--but you can't rely on it, since the people you are going to ask the question about in the first place--the people for whom you might have to evaluate a possible insanity defense--are precisely the people in whom you can't rely on them going together.
filmgirlcw 6y ago
In the US, the insanity defense is almost never used because it is so rarely successful and because the statutes are so high (especially since laws were passed in 1984 in response to the acquittal of John Hinckley, the man that shot President Reagan. He was committed to a psychiatric hospital instead and was released in 2016 (though there are strict rules around his release)). The Andrea Yates case [1], was the last time I can remember it being argued in a high profile case. This was the woman that drowned her five children. She was convicted in her first trial (though the jury refused to give her the death penalty) and that was overturned a few years later, after one of the prosecution’s psychiatrist admitted to giving materially false testimony. She was found not-guilty by reason of insanity in the retrial and confined to a state mental health facility. The Yates case is a good example of how high the burden of proof of an insanity defense is in a murder case. No one on either side disputed that she was severely mentally ill at the time of the killings. The state’s argument was that despite that, she knew the difference between and wrong enough to be legally responsible. There was a whole bunch of stuff in that case too — and it is truly tragic situation for everyone involved (there were reports that after Yates was properly medicated in prison awaiting trial and found out/remembered what she did, she became highly suicidal/went into shock), and there is an argument to be made that she was not given the proper care by her doctors leading up to the murders - but my point is more to say, in what as an outsider, appears to be a textbook case for successfully using the insanity defense, it was still unsuccessful until appeal and retrial, in part because of the question of comprehension. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Yates https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Yates