While a few theories are not as regular, others have developed and are utilized as a part of numerous criminal reviews today. Cutting edge criminologists consolidate the most important aspects of sociology, psychology, anthropology, and biological theories to advance their comprehension of criminal behavior. Rational choice theory, psychological, biological, and strain theory are used to analyze the
Houston, Texas, was home to Andrea Yates; a wife and a mother to Randy Yates and their five children. One morning in the year 2001, she dialed, 911 breathing heavily into the phone “I need a police officer,” (O’Malley). The news over Andrea Yates drowning her children spread like wildfire across the nation, horrifying Americans. Following her confession, she pleaded innocent with the “Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity” (NGRI) plea, yet the jury rejected her appeal and found her guilty of five accounts of first-degree murder. However, in the retrial of 2006, Yates’ abiding murder convictions were overturned, and Andrea Yates was found NGRI.
A case can be changed due to the call of the insanity plea. Nevertheless, This may cause a possible difference to the charge of the defence. In a court case dealing with murder such as the issue with the Clutter family, the Insanity plea was brought into thought to test if Perry and Dick were mentally stable during that time. By definition, the insanity plea is an argument stating the defense was not responsible for their actions due to a psychiatric disease at the time of the act, consequently, making him/her unaware of the occurring actions moreover the later consequences. In the book, In Cold Blood by Truman Capote, the main characters Perry and Dick killed the Clutter family committing the crime of the century.
In June of 2001, the entire nation was deeply disturbed by the horrific acts committed by a suburban Texas housewife, and mother of five. Andrea Yates had drowned all five of her young children in the bathtub of their home. Yates called the authorities and her husband Rusty Yates to the home, where she confessed to killing her children. According to Faith McLellan of the Lancet Medical Journal, Andrea Yates’s bizarre reasoning behind this horrific act was because she believed to have been marked by Satan, and that in order to save her children from hell she needed to take their lives (McLellan, 2006). Yates pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity on the basis of mental defect due to postpartum depression and postpartum psychosis.
The insanity defence is one of the most controversial topics in the legal system, used by many criminal defendants as an excuse for their unlawful activities. In fact, the Canadian legal system has experienced this in the case of Valentine Shortis, an Irish Immigrant who was convicted of killing two men, injuring one and attempted murder on March 1, 1895. Charged with murder and sentenced to death, Valentine’s Lawyer St. Pierre argued that he suffered from insanity, such as his inability to distinguish right from wrong. There was evidence from Shortis's friends, family, and neighbours who claimed that Shortis was arrogant and mischievous person. According to Friedland, the crown (Macmaster) stated that “he did many eccentric, rash and even
The kinds of Treatment received should target factors that are associated with criminal behavior. A mixture of attitudes and beliefs that support a criminal lifestyle and criminal behavior is “criminal thinking”. Treatments that are able to provide some cognitive skills training can help individuals recognize errors in judgment that
He tried to create a partner that would never leave and in order to accomplish this he drilled holes in their skulls and tried different chemicals to try to create a “zombie.” Dahmer’s twisted logic led him to eat his victims in order for them to be a part of him. Clearly, these actions are not of a person you would consider sane. Dahmer tried unsuccessfully to uses the insanity defense.
What exactly is the insanity defense? In a criminal trial situation the insanity defense is used to explain that the defendant was not responsible for his or her actions at the time the crime was committed due to a mental health illness or a mental handicap. Now you have to think of the reasoning, is this form of defense used as an actual defense for one who irresponsibly committed a crime or as a last resort hoping for an acquittal before a defendant is about to be handed a guilty verdict? Most people being asked would say it is being used for sane people trying to get out of a crime they committed, but I believe the insanity defense is misunderstood by society and should strictly be used for its creation of mentally ill individuals.
Destiny Colon I definitely think that malingering or faking insanity should have an added punishment for the offender who is trying to get away with the crimes that they committed. I feel like if they have some sort of way to show the offenders that malingering will cause more harm than good, there would less false insanity pleas (even though the numbers are already low). Malingering only really postpones the trail and makes it harder for everybody involved in the case. Zanathul Ahmed I do think that the media likes to exaggerate the amount of times that someone actually pleas for insanity.
Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity (NGRI) is a form of insanity defense that allows for an individual to not be found guilty of a crime due to a mental defect or disease that results in a lack of mens rea, or the capability to intentionally commit a crime. However, simply having a mental illness or defect does not guarantee that an offender will be found NGRI. Not only would a defendant have to have a major or severe mental illness or disease, but the defendant would have to prove that their condition impaired them so greatly as to not have any control over their behavior or any concept that they had done anything wrong at the time of the offense. Although Bob undoubtedly had a diminished capacity for logic and reason in this case, the example as given does not provide enough detail to determine the nature of Bob’s personality or his potential motives in committing this crime. Nevertheless, there is one major flaw to Bob’s insanity defense: he tried to hide the crime.
Developmental theories look at how offenders start and end their criminal behaviors. All developmental theories, including the two focused on in this paper, pull from social, psychological, and biological factors to find answers. Both of these theories follow along a trajectory or pathway for offenders. Sampson and Laub’s age-graded theory has offenders following along two possible trajectories. They can either follow along the high risk trajectory or the low risk trajectory.
In this day and age, our country has been reshaped into a better place by the work and reforms of incredible people and reformers of the mid-1800s. After many religious revivals such as the Second Great Awakening from about 1800 to the 1840’s, it inspired thousands of Americans to reform their society. Transcendentalism, known as a belief stating that people should use emotions and intuitions to go beyond logical thinking to reach a truer understanding of the world around them, became a famous optimistic idea often written to inspire Americans by Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau. This and the religious revival, joined model communities to soon pick up speed on the spirit of reform spreading through the states. Children without
It cannot be overlooked that developmental issues and life experiences play a major role as well. In the modern world, these issues and experiences are analyzed and studied by prevalent criminality and psychopathology fields within the criminal justice system. After all, trying to understand why individuals chose to commit crimes and break the law is necessary to prevent them and rehabilitate criminals. Since the nineteenth century, criminal defendants have used mental incapacity and insanity to excuse their criminal activity. This has resulted in the study of psychopathology and crime causation being of significant importance to criminal justice.
The court system should acknowledge the offenders past and realize that the reasons they are committing crimes are not their free will, it is elements in their past that have caused them to act in a deviant manner. Furthermore, Cullen and Johnson (2017) agree by stating, “science has demonstrated that un-chosen individual traits (e.g., temperament, self-control, IQ) and un-chosen social circumstances (e.g., family, school, community) can be
Where external and internal factors play a part and they are fated to be a criminal. The scientific grounds are offenders and people who have not yet offended can be given help, and they can be diagnosed by experts and receive treatment needed to not offend (Cavadino, 2007
