The Insanity Plea

Paper Summary:

In the worlds of criminal justice and psychology, the insanity plea is a controversial subject, and some experts believe that it can be abused and allow criminals to get away with committing horrific crimes. Others contend that the insanity plea is necessary to protect the mentally unstable. This paper provides a discussion on the insanity plea, how it works in the criminal justice system, and how it relates to psychology.

From the Paper:

"The book goes on to assert that the insanity plea is so controversial because of the very nature of insanity. The author explains that because mental stability is wide ranging it is difficult to determine what type of mental incapacity is defined as insanity. For this reason, when there is a plea of insanity jurors must decide the defendants fate based on whether they were 'so irrational as to be nonresponsible'. (MacKay 1995) In other words "the moral basis of the insanity defence, states that the crucial issue 'is whether in some cases extreme craziness (involved in the defendant's offensive conduct) so compromises the defendant's rationality or creates such compulsion that it would be unjust to hold the defendant responsible." "

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