Insanity plea - Research Paper Example

Of importance to note is that, a person is liable to have committed crime when he or she has committed an illegal act, and or intended to commit an illegal act such as murder, stealing rape among other heinous acts (Anderson and Gardner 52). Simply, the issue of insanity does not revolve around the diagnosis that the accused undergoes but rather the impact that it might have caused on his or her ability to do specific things at the said time when there was an alleged criminal act. Hence, the Law stipulated that it is the relevant factor revolves around a person ability to do a specific thing but not the diagnosis symptoms that are affiliated to him or her (Brooks and Brakel 10).

The defense of insanity is only present when a court absolutely declares that there is the absence or present of legal insanity in that the defendant being sane, but also having a medical disease or defect to extent of not being able to resist committing a given criminal act (Brooks and Brakel 12). . In any court proceeding where the accused is thought of being insane or an insanity defense is found necessary, the accused begins by admitting that he or she committed the crime before a panel of a jury or judges.

The lawyer then takes up the case of the accused by convincing the judges that the accused or defendant should not be held responsible for the alleged crime because he or she was mentally incapacitated as at when crime was committed. Thus, the lawyer tries to get the judges convinced as they give their verdict, to give consideration on the state of mind of the defendant objectively as they lay down their description of the victims in a given case (Fersch 2). History of Insanity Defense Pre –McNaughton At present, the defense put upon insanity is confirmatory, meaning that the defendant is at liberty to argue that they are ‘insane’.

In case they are confirmed to be insane, the elements of the case are automatically null and void. Never the less, the defendant must be in a position to prove the ‘insanity defense; through a comprehensible and persuasive evidence (Worrall and Siegel 62). The argument for an insanity defense over centuries has been alleged as immoral especially when the person being punished is not responsible for their criminal behavior. It further argues that if a person is unconscious of what he or she is doing at the time when the crime is committed then that person is not reliable for the act (Worrall and Siegel 62).

According to Pre -McNaughton rule on insanity, three main phases are used to test the phenomenon. They include; “the good and evil test”, “the wild beast test”, and “the right and wrong test” (Worrall and