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Recommended: Insanity Defense
When the police were called to Andrea Yates suburban Hudson Texas home in June 20th 2001 they were not prepared for what they were about to see. The police were shocked to see Andreas five children dead while Andrea acted completely calm and admitted to drowning them one by one in the family bath tub. Andrea had previous mental health issues which she had been hospitalized including suicide attempts. She had been suffering with very sever postpartum depression and post part partum psychosis, two illnesses that would make Andrea very dangerous to herself and those around her, especially her children. Andrea went to trial against the Harris County Texas District Attorney who were convicting her of capital murder and asking for the death penalty,
At the 2002 trial, Yates pleaded not guilty, by using the insanity defense. The insanity defense argues that an individual should not be found guilty of a crime if they have a persistent psychiatric disease at the time the crime was committed. It was proved that Yates could tell right from wrong, so she did not meet the definition of the insanity in Texas (Walsh). The jury deliberated for almost four hours, and finally found Yates guilty. The jury rejected her insanity defense, and Yates was sentenced to life in prison.
Insanity is an illness an individual cannot overcome and will make decisions without thinking. Lacking the further knowledge of a criminal's mental state does not endorse the fate of acquiring the death
It lists that in order to declare a defendant not guilty by insanity, it must be proven that the person is significantly mentally ill and was not able to differentiate right from wrong in the instance of their crime (Levin). There was no dispute between prosecution or defense that Andrea was mentally ill, it was simply if her illness inhibited her judgement enough to meet the legal standards. Her family and defense attorney all believed that there was no questioning the severity of her condition, she simply could not function as a regular human being, and her judgement was clouded. Andrea’s mother-in-law, Dora Yates, who frequently watched over Andrea and witnessed her daily condition, stated, “I don't think she knew how to cope . . . how to function.
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 the field of criminal law there is a certain type of criminal defense that comes to the court and has a low success rate. These cases concern the mental capacity of the defendant and if they have enough mental capacity, or are sane enough, to be aware of their crime and consequences of crime. The insanity defense is extremely rare because of how difficult it is for the defense to prove to the court and jury that the defendant did not have the mental capacity to understand what they did wrong and the consequences from it. The case of Myers III v. State of Indiana is one example of criminal responsibility and mental capacity. This case has information that can be connected to the textbook with the insanity defense tests, mental competence
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.
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.
During my true crime podcast era, I came across Andrea Yates. Yates was a mother who killed her five young children by drowning them in a bathtub. While listening to this case, it was revealed that the insanity plea, or also known as the insanity defense, was used. It got me thinking about how the plea works and how people would allow this outcome over a jail sentence. The insanity plea is a tough topic to tackle in the world of criminal law.
Yet, there is a significant proportion of death row inmates are mentally ill and the research evidence found suggests that mental illness is often, in fact, an aggravating factor as far as capital sentencing bodies are concerned. The Supreme Court eventually came to the conclusion of this: “If it is cruel and unusual punishment to hold convicted criminals in unsafe conditions, it must be unconstitutional to confine the involuntarily committed - who may not be punished at all - in unsafe conditions” (French, 2005) There are rights that each individual has, and there needs to be guidelines to make sure each person is treated fairly, even if they do not deserve such
There are actually many intricacies associated in a mental health court process. For instance, there are “probations, parole, the courts, jails, the community health system…” involve in the cases, which is difficult to manage, especially, for someone with a mental disorder (Docgurley, 2011). Simply penalizing accused mentally ill people will not help them become better, so through this court system, they can maintain their human rights and have the support they require to improve their condition. Mental health court, thus, is a sufficient system because it will not incarcerate and isolate indicted mentally ill
Is The Insanity Defense Overused? Back in the year 1993, six people were killed and nineteen injured. In 1996, a man named Colin Ferguson was convicted of this mass shooting. While his attorney believed he was mentally incompetent to stand trial, he felt he could be his own attorney and decided to not go through with the insanity defense in favor of a story that somebody else did the mass shooting instead, leaving him there. This is probably one of the more known cases when the insanity defense is brought up.
Like all form of disparities, mental health disparities is a serious challenge for minorities’ communities across America. Individuals with mental health illness how do not receive adequate health care due to variations can be affected in many ways. When their mental illness progress without any diagnosis they can easily be perceived as a threat to society. In cases where crimes are committed, and they cannot prove they are mentally challenged they can be charge and send to prison without being diagnosed which could affect their condition due to the lack of treatment. Without eradicating or implementing policies to deal with mental health disparities the probability of legally or morally assuming that people with mental health challenges are
In my opinion I don’t believe that the cognitive test goes far enough. The cognitive test is used in evaluating whether a defendant may rely on an insanity defense. [1] An insanity defense is pretty intense and hard to prove. The cognitive test eliminates other mental incapacity before they can be explained. Other tests will allow for other mental conditions to look at more in-depth.
BOOM! To the front of the head. In a blink of an eye, she was gone. Betty Williams was a young Christian girl, but she also liked getting people’s attention by doing crazy things. Betty was well known for being in different plays.