The Mental Disorder Defence is an essential part of Canada’s justice system because it provides a more accurate form of aid and rehabilitation for offenders who are not criminally minded, but mentally ill. When an individual loses touch with reality, which is a symptom of schizophrenia, they are unaware of their actions and should not be held responsible for them. Dissociative disorders would also likely be subject to this defence since individuals affected by this suffered major memory loss without a clear physical cause and therefore might be unaware of their actions. Unless psychosis, the loss of contact with reality, occurs a mentally ill offender should be treated like any other criminal and not subject to the Mental Disorder Defence. Although mental illnesses such as depression and anxiety can make day to day life difficult for an individual, they are still able to …show more content…
When a mentally ill patient is prescribed medication, it usually lessens symptoms and sometimes eradicates them. If an individual has been diagnosed with a mental illness and prescribed medication, but willingly abstains from taking this prescription, they should not be able to use the Mental Disorder Defence because the situation could have easily been avoided by the individual following their doctors orders. Every case must be looked at on an individual basis though since the needs of everyone, especially those who are mentally ill, are unique. Even if the Mental Disorder Defence does not work for a mentally ill offender, their mental illness should be taken into consideration when they are being sentenced. Many forms of punishment would be ineffective for a mentally ill offender, so alternative punishments should be considered based on one’s mental illness so that the justice system can work with the health system to rehabilitate the offender back into
Rock, M. (2001). Emerging issues with mentally ill offenders: Casues and social consequences. Administration and Policy in Mental Health., 165-180.
According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) (2013) mental illness is defined as a health
“Not guilty by reason of insanity” (NGRI) has often perplexed even the most stringent of legal and psychiatric professionals for centuries. Moreover, it has transcended into the pop culture, as a “loophole”for the criminal society. However, the insanity defense is only used in less than 1% of criminal cases, and used successfully in only 10-25% of those cases (Torry and Billick, 2010). In order to successfully be acquitted by reason of insanity, the legal team, paired with psychiatric professionals, must prove that the defendant is not legally responsible for the crime, despite the evidence that they executed the crime. They must also prove that the defendant, was or is currently suffering from a mental disorder, and that the defendant have/had a impaired logical control of their actions (Smith, 2011). According to Torry and Billick (2010), “A criminal act must have two components: evil intent (mens rea, literally “guilt mind”) and action (actus reus, literally “guilty act”)” (p.225), thus the defendant must prove that he/she did not have “mens rea” or “actus reus.” Equally important to note, the act itself must be voluntary and conscious. The the majority of the psychological and judicial court system have a reluctance to hold defendants who lack the capability needed to understand “right from wrong” (Torry and Billick, 2010). It has been proven that over the course of many years, the NGRI have been difficult to apply. During the early 1980’s, many states modernized their NGRI defense and even abolished the defense altogether. Instead of allowing the the “not guilty by reason of insanity” defense, many states have established a verdict of “guilty but mentally ill” (GBMI) (Smith, 2011). In order to make sure that individuals w...
Many people believe that mental illness affects certain ages, religions, races, genders, or income levels more than others do but that is not the case ("NAMI: National Alliance on Mental Illness | Mental Illnesses"). There are many forms of mental illnesses that affect people, such as depression, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, panic disorder, post traumatic stress disorder, and borderline personality disorder. These illnesses come from a variety of different factors and conclude in ...
For those that don’t know, the insanity plea, as defined by Cornell Law, is based on the fact that a person accused of a crime can acknowledge that he/she committed the crime, but argue that he/she is not responsible for it because of his or her mental illness, by pleading “not guilty by reason of insanity”. This first became a problem in 1843. Daniel M’Naughten was trialed for shooting the secretary of the Prime Minister in attempt to assassinate the Prime Minister himself. It was said that M’Naughten thought the Prime Minister was the person behind all his personal and financial problems. The jury ruled him “not guilty by reason of insanity”. The reason for the verdict was M’Naughten...
Wouldn’t it be completely irrational to sentence every mentally ill individual to jail purely because they suffered from a mental illness? Often, mentally ill people behave in an eccentric manner and allure the attention of police officers who do not differentiate the mentally ill from mentally stable people and immediately charge them with misdemeanors. There are approximately 300,000 inmates, with the number increasing every year, which suffer from a mental illness and do not receive proper treatment. Jails are not adequately equipped to care for mentally ill inmates, which can lead to an escalation of an inmate’s illness. Society has failed to provide enough social resources for citizens suffering from psychiatric illnesses in its community, transferring mentally unstable individuals between mental institutions and jails, when in fact adequate aid such as providing proper medication, rehabilitation opportunities, and more psychiatric hospitals in communities is a necessity to reconstitute these individuals.
But a person with a mental illness has to be evaluated and sometimes not even trialed and let go. This is where equality and inequality plays a role. Equality, the state of being equal, especially in status, rights, and opportunities. Inequality, the lack of equality. If the defendant is severely mentally disabled and in need of treatment, he or she will be provided treatment, either in prison or in a mental health facility. Even with a mental illness they should be charged like anybody else would because they are human and should be held responsible for what they
NAMI beliefs “mental illness” is a medical condition just like diabetes or a heart problem. Instead of affecting bodily functions a mental illness “disrupts a person’s thinking, feeling, mood, ability to relate to others and daily functions.” Mental illness is not due to a weakness, a bad upbringing or caused by the individual. Both a mental illness and another medical diagnoses can make it harder for an individual to deal with daily life and by seeking treatm...
The issue of executing mentally ill criminals has been widely debated among the public. They debate on whether it is right or wrong to execute a person who does not possess the capacity to think correctly. The mental illness is a disease that destroys a person’s memory, emotion, and prevent one or more function of the mind running properly. The disease affects the way a person thinks, feels, behaves and relates to others.When a person is severely mentally ill, his/ her ability to appreciate reality lack so they aspire to do stuff that is meaningless. The sickness is triggered by an amalgamation of genetic, and environmental factors not a personal imperfection. On the death penalty website, Scott Panetti who killed his mother in-law and father-in-law reports that since 1983, over 60 people with mental illness or retardation have been executed in the United States (Panetti). The American Civil Liberties Union says that it is unconstitutional to execute someone who suffered from an earnest mental illness (ACLU).Some people apply the term crazy or mad to describe a person who suffers from astringent psychological disorders because a mad person look different than a mundane human being. The time has come for us to accept the fact that executing mentally ill offenders is not beneficial to society for many reasons. Although some mentally ill criminals have violated the law, we need to sustain a federal law that mentally ill criminals should not be put to death.
Mental diseases affect a person’s motivation and will. Illnesses of the mind can make activities that were once fun and enjoyable the complete opposite. Most people diagnosed with mental disorders become more anxious when doing certain things, have completely lost interest in what used to be preferred, become too paranoid to relax, etc. Interests and priorities seemingly change. This also brings conflict into daily routines and sets off a chain reaction in one’s life. Their normal routines are then replaced with ones that involve medications and the constant reminder of dosages, times, amounts, side effects, etc. When someone’s routines are affected, this can wreak havoc on more than just the victim of the disease. Friends, family members, jobs, and even pets have to adapt. More than that, this chain reaction can possibly trigger someone during
The insanity defense pertains that the issue of the concept of insanity which defines the extent to which a person accused of crimes may be alleviated of criminal responsibility by reason of mental disease. “The term insanity routinely attracts widespread public attention that is far out of proportion to the defense’s impact on criminal justice” (Butler,133). The decision of this defense is solely determined by the trial judge and the jury. They determine if a criminal suffers from a mental illness. The final determination of a mental disease is solely on the jury who uses evidence and information drawn from an expert witness. The result of such a determination places the individual accused, either in a mental facility, incarcerated or released from all charges. Due to the aforementioned factors, there are many problems raised by the insanity defense. Some problems would be the actual possibility of determining mental illness, justify the placement of the judged “mentally ill” offenders and the total usefulness of such a defense. In all it is believed that the insanity defense should be an invalid defense and that it is useless and should potentially be completely abolished.
Critical to understanding the extent of the problem is a clear definition of mentally ill, “a person suffering from mental illness and, owing to that illness, there are reasonable grounds for believing that care, treatment or control of the person is necessary for the person’s own protection from serious harm, or for the protection of others from serious harm” [Mental Health Act 2007 (NSW)]. Noting that the statute specifies the ‘control’ of this group which adds to the notion that people with mental health problems are inherently more dangerous members of our society. Furthermore mental health problems within the prison system (inmate population) are estimated to be three to four times higher than in the general Australian popula...
In conclusion, it is obvious that a mental illness is a serious condition. It is important for a person experiencing symptoms, such as those associated with the different types of mental illnesses, to seek out appropriate medical treatment. Having a mental illness is a disease and shouldn't be associated with a specific weakness in an individual. Seeking treatment is the best thing that one can do to help ensure a life that has more positive situations than negative thoughts and emotions.
In the past, mental illness was taboo to discuss and there was fear surrounding the topic. However, remarkable strides have been made in figuring out the causes of the disease and weighing the most effective treatments specialized for each specific disease. According to the American Psychotic Association, “A mental illness is a medical condition that disrupts a person's thinking, feeling, mood, ability to relate to others and daily functioning. Just as diabetes is a disorder of the pancreas, mental illnesses are medical conditions that often result in a diminished capacity for coping with the ordinary demands of life.”
In today’s world, mental illness is still looked upon as a very bad thing and the negative views of mental illness are common within the employees. Most of the time, people assume that employees who suffer from mental illness are often seen as weird, defensive, and hard to talk to. Generally, concepts about mental illness tend to be subjective, leading to difficulties in defining mental illness. One article has described mental illness as, “ mentally distorted, mad, or crazy” and the degree of mental illness varies depending from person to person (Corrigan et al. 2010, p. 909). The following essay is based on the topic ‘Mental Illness as an Emerging Discourse’ and the article ‘Employee Mental Illness: Managing the Hidden Epidemic’ was the main article that was analysed and used in the essay to discuss the topic. The analysis has been divided into two parts which are covered equally by the study group members.