Mental State and Crime

Mental State and Crime “Nature, Mr. Allnut, is what we are put in this world to rise above.” Katherine Hepburn to Humphrey Bogart, The African Queen

Offenders by Age and Sex (Britain)

Crime involves: 1. legally proscribed conduct (actus reus) 2. that causes harm 3. coincides with blameworthy frame of mind (mens rea) 4. and carries with it punishment

Self-Defense Use of force to repel an imminent, unprovoked attack, in which defendant reasonably believes that s/he or others might be seriously injured and where there is no alternative May include defense of property when it is the home

M’Naghten test 1843 British Case – attempt on life of Prime Minister, Sir Robert Peel Defendant must be “laboring under such a defect of reason, from disease of the mind, as not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing; or, if he did know it, that he did not know what he was doing was wrong.”

Irresistible impulse Defendant must show that: Mental diseases has deprived the accused of willpower to resist the insane impulse Rather than focus on impaired mens rea, focuses on impaired actus reus

Durham rule Durham v. U.S. (1954) Defendant must show that unlawful acts were the product of a mental disease or defect Makes standard more medical in nature, less about moral responsibility