Insanity Defense Reform Act of 1984

The Insanity Defense Reform Act of 1984 (IDRA) was signed into law by President Ronald Reagan on October 12, 1984,^[1] amending the United States federal laws governing defendants with mental diseases or defects to make it significantly more difficult to obtain a verdict of not guilty only by reason of insanity.

Act

The act removed the volitional component, that a defendant lacked capacity to conform their conduct to the law, from the ALI test.^[2]^: 615 Defendants were exculpated only if "at the time of the commission of the acts constituting the offense, ... as the result of a severe mental disease or defect, unable to appreciate the nature and quality or wrongfulness of acts."^[2]^: 634 The law passed in the wake of public outrage after John Hinckley Jr.'s acquittal by reason of insanity in June 1982 for his attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan.^[2]^{: 634–635}

Prior to the enactment of the law, the federal standard for "insanity" was that the government had to prove a defendant's sanity beyond a reasonable doubt (assuming the insanity defense was raised). Following the Act's enactment, the defendant has the burden of proving insanity by "clear and convincing evidence".^[3] Furthermore, expert witnesses for either side are prohibited from testifying directly as to whether the defendant was legally sane or not,^[3] but can only testify as to their mental health and capacities, with the question of sanity itself to be decided by the finder-of-fact at trial.^{[citation needed]} The Act was held to be constitutional (and the change in standards and burdens of proof are discussed) in United States v. Freeman.^[3]

The Defense Reform Act was criticized by psychologist Lawrence Z. Freedman for being ineffective: "If the attacker is rational mentally, stable emotionally, and fanatic politically, he will not be deterred. Nor will an irrational, affectively disturbed individual be deterred."^[4]

References

^ United States Department of Justice, Criminal Resource Manual, Retrieved May 7, 2018
^ ^a ^b ^c Criminal Law - Cases and Materials, 7th ed. 2012, Wolters Kluwer; John Kaplan, Robert Weisberg, Guyora Binder, ISBN 978-1-4548-0698-1,
^ ^a ^b ^c United States v. Freeman, 804 F. 2d 1574 (11th Cir. 1986).
^ Lawrence Zelic Freedman (March 1983), "The Politics of Insanity: Law, Crime, and Human Responsibility", Political Psychology, 4 (1): 171–178, doi:10.2307/3791182, JSTOR 3791182

External links

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[1] United States Department of Justice, Criminal Resource Manual, Retrieved May 7, 2018

[CL-2] Criminal Law - Cases and Materials, 7th ed. 2012, Wolters Kluwer; John Kaplan, Robert Weisberg, Guyora Binder, ISBN 978-1-4548-0698-1,

[freeman-3] United States v. Freeman, 804 F. 2d 1574 (11th Cir. 1986).

[4] Lawrence Zelic Freedman (March 1983), "The Politics of Insanity: Law, Crime, and Human Responsibility", Political Psychology, 4 (1): 171–178, doi:10.2307/3791182, JSTOR 3791182

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