xXGeckoXx said:
Craorach said:
I don't consider it a defense except in the cases where it is "temporary insanity" brought on by rage, pain or other circumstances.
However.. I think people have far to much of a view that this plea leads to people not being punished... a high security psych ward is definately not better, and for most people probably far worse, than prison.
Temporary insanity is a scary thing. On one hand insanity does not seem to be a good defence but then you think, what if it is possible that they "get better".
Then they get better. Just like people who have gone to jail for their allotted time get let out.
Their time is done, and the public (with the possible exception of the victims) should totally accept that without question or argument as it is the basis of any legal system. Victims of crimes are permitted some tolerance for their emotional response, of course, but not someone who has no first hand knowledge of the situation or the people involved.
Of course.. the idea of "getting better" is somewhat unlikely. The psychiatric profession as a whole doesn't like people to get better.. they want people under treatment for life.
It is, in fact, that profession that is making these plea's turn into a slippery slope argument. Psychiatrists are attempting to pretty much anyone without a hyper normal mental condition as "sick" rather than just different, or even "a jerk". The more behavioural quirks they blame on a medical condition they just made up, the less reasonable this "defence" becomes
