As a result, Daniel M'Naughten was sentenced to a mental institution for the rest of his life because he was declared mentally ill at the time he committed the crime (Legal Information Institute, 2010; (Cornell, 2010). Some people use "temporary" insanity or "heat of the moment" defenses to justify why the crime occurred but, at the same time, the person who commited the offense should not go to jail (Covey, 2011)
Interestingly enough, most mental health professionals were on board with him being competent while prosecutors tended to say the opposite. Regardless, it was found that, at least at the time, that New York law was far from clear as to how such situations could or should be handled from a legally viable standpoint (Cheatham & Litwack, 2003)
Indeed, when people talk about what is known as Stockholm Syndrome, they are essentially referring to Patty Hearst. Stockholm Syndrome is when somebody that normally does not break the law or would never hurt others is coerced into taking up with his or her captors and that is precisely what Hearst did as it relates to the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) (Emory, 2010)
There are others still that try to harm their fetus in utero and there is the dual question of whether the mother can or should be charged and whether the fetus should be treated as a life regardless of the answer to the first question due to the implications this opinion would have on abortion and its legality (Rhodes & Segre, 2013). There is also the question about whether disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can be used as a defense for sexual assault of children (Grover, 2007)
Some go far as to say that the insanity defense should be abolished outright. However, there are moral question as to whether this could or should be done (Hathaway, 2009)
One treatise about the subject asserts that professionals need to use a three-stage process to show the proper part of the legal responsibility/mental health spectrum that people fall upon. They note that if the three stage process is not started properly, this can directly undermine choices and assessments made as the process grinds on (Kalis & Meynen, 2014)
One way in which there is a clear delineation between truly insane acts and defendants that are "playing insane" is the use of what is known as forensic psychiatry. While forensic psychology is fairly well-known, forensic psychiatry is lesser known but has become just as important and this is especially true when talking about defendants that might or will be using the insanity defense (Meynen, 2012)
After all, one person's terrorist is another's freedom fighter and the lines between the two are not nearly as clean and clear as some would have the public believe. Even Muslim extremists feel justified in taking up arms against American soldiers due to the wars and behaviors of American soldiers and politicians over the years even if the applicable Americans laugh off or reject such assertions (Muslim & Chaleby, 2007)
For example, there are women who are new mothers that actually kill their children. There are others still that try to harm their fetus in utero and there is the dual question of whether the mother can or should be charged and whether the fetus should be treated as a life regardless of the answer to the first question due to the implications this opinion would have on abortion and its legality (Rhodes & Segre, 2013)
This is probably due to the objective vs. subjective factors mentioned above (Schweitzer & Saks, 2011)
Some people use "temporary" insanity or "heat of the moment" defenses to justify why the crime occurred but, at the same time, the person who commited the offense should not go to jail (Covey, 2011). Much of medical, psychology and psychiatry fields are meant to be precise and specific but there is a lot of room for interpretation and manipulation when it comes to all medical and mental details about these crimes and the associated defenses except for brain scans and the like (Shiels, 2014)
One such mental disorder would be borderline personality disorder (BPD). It is held by one study that BPD is a "complex mental disorder that straddles the line between psychosis and neurosis" (Sisti & Caplan, 2012)
This stands in contrast to "temporary insanity," which Smith refers to as "fiction" more than reality. He says it is possible for there to be "temporary insanity" just as there is "permanent insanity" but that the chances of a person becoming insane and then sane in such as short window is extremely unlikely and quite difficult to answer in a way that is definitive enough for a legal matter like a criminal trial (Smith, 2012)
Also, it has to be admitted and stated outwardly that not guilty by reason of insanity cases hardly ever involve murder or other extremely depraved acts and this sample was no different. For this sample, the reasons for revocation of release included being dangerous to others, non-adherence to medication schedules, non-adherence to therapy schedules and previous violent charnges (Vitacco, Vauter, Erickson & Ragatz, 2014)
The marital relationship of the Mrs. Bobbitt and her husband occurred as that of constant physical atrocities perpetrated by the man to her wife (Margolick, 1994)