Mental Condition Defences And The Criminal Justice System

Mental Condition Defences and the Criminal Justice System

Criminal law has struggled to keep pace with developments in psychiatry, both in substantive and procedural terms, and it is widely recognised that increased inter-disciplinary discussion of mental condition defences is required in order to address this gap between the law and psychiatry. This edited collection comes at a time of review of this sensitive area of criminal law. The Law Commission for England and Wales recently placed its evaluation of insanity, automatism and intoxication on hold, while it considers the law on unfitness to plead. These reviews are set against the backdrop of earlier Law Commission reports on partial defences to murder which informed significant changes that were made to the law in this area under sections 52–56 of the Coroners and Justice Act 2009. Recent developments in case law in this substantive area illustrate not only the importance of the role of the medical expert, but also that reform in this area is informed by ongoing inter-disciplinary research. This collection brings together medical and legal conceptions of mental disorder in order to appraise the operation of mental condition defences. In this respect, it provides invaluable and original insights into mental condition defences and criminal law.

Mental Condition Defences in the Criminal Law

Mental condition defences have been used in several high profile and controversial criminal trials in recent years. Indeed, mental abnormality is increasingly an important yet complex course of defence within the criminal trial process. In this timely study, Professor Mackay offers a detailed critical analysis of these defences within the Criminal Law where the accused relies on some form of mental abnormality as a source of defence/negotiation. Topics covered include the defences of automatism, insanity, diminished responsibility and infanticide; self-induced incapacity and the doctrine of fault. It also includes a chapter on unfitness to plead, which although not a defence has been included because of its important relationship to mental disorder within the criminal process. Drawing upon a wide variety of legal, psychiatric and philosophical sources, this is a timely contribution to a controversial and complex topic.

GUIDE TO MENTAL DISORDER LAW IN CANADIAN CRIMINAL JUSTICE.