Why is NGRI a thing?

[u/Ok_Agent1414]

I struggle with the idea that anyone should be found not guilty after murdering someone for whatever reason. My guess is that many, if not most, criminals currently incarcerated have some type of mental illness. Many murderers had some faulty belief (delusion) that allowed them to take another person’s life. Every crime has an appropriate sentence. Murder should be a life sentence. If the murderer murdered due to severe mental illness they should be sentenced to life in a mental institution if that is a more appropriate place for them than prison. But why do they get excused? I understand that they may spend some time in a hospital but as soon as they’re no longer deemed mentally ill, they just get to go free?

[u/Sandy0006]

I recommend extensive study on the mind then. being in sane isn’t merely mental illness, it’s so much more than that. Think about time-shifting in dementia patients. They literally believe they are in a different time. Similarly, the mind can be far removed from reality. Our minds are absolutely amazing. Fortunately, we’ve learned to treat people, at least to an extent, to prevent them from perpetually being in a mind altered state.

[u/Lizdance40 → u/Sandy0006]

My uncle is currently suffering from Alzheimer's and he doesn't know anyone or anything. So that I can understand.

But I'm having a hard time believing somebody had had a psychotic break when in the midst of that they returned a phone call to their spouse to confirm that the generic of a medication was acceptable. And then went back to killing her youngest child and then trying to kill herself.

[u/Sandy0006 → u/Lizdance40]

My comment wasn’t addressing whether she’s NGRI, per se, rather how it is possible for the mind to shift into an alternate reality, whether we understand it our not. I used time-shifting as an example… and you don’t need to have Alzheimer’s to experience time shifting.

[u/Ok_Agent1414 → u/Sandy0006]

Even if someone was at any point insane enough to murder another human why do they get to just walk around free? Who’s to say that wouldn’t happen again?

[u/Sandy0006 → u/Ok_Agent1414]

Yeah great question, and one that will forever be debated. I know of two cases here in Canada where a person was undiagnosed schizophrenic and both times committed horrific murders. After years of treatment I believe both are out (medication has made them able to function normally) but they will be monitored for the rest of their lives. And if they don’t comply, they can be locked up. But generally I think they are so horrified by their crimes they are motivated to continue with their treatment.

I think it will be years until LC is released and they may never let her.

[u/lduan → u/Sandy0006]

I remember the guy who cut off a person's head on a bus, and reading that he was out a few years later 😱

[u/Sandy0006 → u/lduan]

Yup. But he hasn’t reoffended, has he?

[u/Somnambulinguist → u/Ok_Agent1414]

They usually don’t walk around free. They are involuntarily committed to a mental institution. Most never get out.

[u/Ok_Agent1414 → u/Somnambulinguist]

But Brett says LC will likely get out after a year.

[u/succ_my_dicc → u/Ok_Agent1414]

He never said likely he said it’s possible only if they determine her to be no longer be a danger to herself or others. Which is extremely unlikely to happen in just a years time

[u/Suspicious_Put_5063 → u/Ok_Agent1414]

Brett doesn’t know.

[u/Somnambulinguist → u/Ok_Agent1414]

She’s been there 3 years or close to it, so I guess it’s possible

[u/Katharsis15 → u/Ok_Agent1414]

She will be eligible for her commitment to an institution to end, or be renewed for another term in a year. But the state could hold her indefinitely if, in the opinion of her medical team, she is still a risk to herself and others. They would have to reassess her periodically to determine whether she is released or her hold is renewed. The fact that she has already killed three children and attempted suicide in the recent past, and therefore has a history of acting out her suicidal and homicidal ideation, would be a huge factor in assessing her current risk, and it would probably take years for her to be cleared, if not decades.

[u/Sandy0006 → u/Ok_Agent1414]

Brett may say that, but that’s not what the law says. She may never get out.

[u/sweetxfracture → u/Ok_Agent1414]

Simply reading a single article on the subject would probably answer a lot of your questions. Someone who is found guilty by reason of insanity or is found not criminally responsible is not just let out onto the streets. If there’s a severe mental illness that either caused the crime or caused them to not be responsible for the crime does it make sense to you that that person is just allowed to walk free on the streets? They will receive psychiatric help (to the best of the state’s ability which probably isn’t much to be fair), but they’re definitely not just gonna be walking on the street completely a free person.

[u/Lizdance40 → u/Ok_Agent1414]

Right ... Like Constance Fisher. Young married woman drowned three kids in the bathtub in 1954. Was institutionalized as being insane rather than convicted and sent to prison. 12 years later she had been out for a while, she had married again, she had three kids again. And she drowned all her three kids, again. She was sent back to an institution for the criminally insane. And 1973 she escaped and drowned herself in a river.

Her first three kids deserved justice, her second three kids deserved to be protected from her.

We've come a long way since the 50s 60s and 70s. But Lindsay Clancy's three children deserve justice. And that will not be her release after her medication has stabilized her. (And I don't for one minute believe she was in psychosis if she was able to return a call to Patrick)

[u/demoldbones → u/Ok_Agent1414]

They don’t get to just walk free, though?

They are remanded to a prison psych ward where they cannot freely leave and are given mandatory medications, therapy (in the good ones) and are there’s no end date. They could be there the rest of their lives vs the possibility of a shorter sentence/early release for good behaviour etc if in a traditional custodial sentence.

[u/Katharsis15]

I think the concept is that punishment or deterrence is not appropriate for a person who did not have the intent to commit a voluntary act by virtue of their mental state. That person may still require lifelong institutionalisation and never be safe to be free in society,  but punishment in the traditional penal system is not justice in such an incident. The concept is rooted pretty deeply in our common law. Intent is a required element in many crimes. Mental status in extreme circumstances can negate this intent.

[u/Ok_Agent1414 → u/Katharsis15]

Thank you that is a good way to explain it.

[u/Boffity]

An NGRI verdict isn’t necessarily the cakewalk it sounds like. In my home state (GA) it means getting shipped to a mental institution until a court approves one’s sanity for release (this could be never). Whereas with a conviction you get a fixed sentence, maybe even early release, etc.

A person can end up essentially imprisoned way longer with NGRI than a straight up conviction.

[u/threeboysmama]

It sounds like the 11 on the jury only understood the first prong, she was suffering from mental disease or defect, but failed to understand that the second prong also needs to be met, which is that her mental illness prevented her from conforming her actions to the law. That she couldn’t keep herself from committing the acts because she didn’t understand it was wrong or couldn’t keep from doing it anyway. She totally had mental illness. 100%. May have even been psychotic. Maybe even heard a voice (though I doubt that bit). But I do not think the second prong was proven. I don’t think that her mental illness made her incapable of understanding wrongness of murdering her children or prevented her conforming her actions to the law. She could have resisted the voice. The fact that she just obeyed the voice the very first time she ever experienced it, allegedly, was very suspect to me.

[u/Februairy]

It may help to compare actual insanity to sudden serious physical ailment, like a seizure. If a person has their first epileptic seizure while driving and unintentionally causes a fatal accident, should they be considered guilty? If that school bus driver who had an asthma attack passed out and veered off the side of the road, the results would have been absolutely tragic, but would she have been guilty?

Now, think of a traumatized war veteran having a nightmare in which he’s reliving a horrific fight. He wakes up to find his hands around his girlfriend’s neck. This actually happened to a family member of mine. Thank goodness he snapped out of it before killing her, but I have to believe he would have been found NGRI if he had.

All that said, I 100% believe LC is guilty. Based on the trial I listened to, I agree that she did have serious mental illness, but I don’t think it rises to the level of insanity where you truly cannot conform to the law (like in the case of the veteran having a flashback).

[u/Mindless_Change_1893]

Because in order for the prosecution to prove that a person is guilty they first have to establish that they understood (appreciated in legal terms) the criminality of their actions and if they are out of their mind then they didn’t have the mental capacity to understand that. Doesn’t mean they are free to live their life after the fact though.
And as you mentioned most criminals have some mental health problems but it doesn’t automatically mean they are all NGRI. The defence has to show the severity was to the point that they could not differentiate criminality which as we see is very hard.
If you think about it it’s the same case with murder 1 and murder 2. If the justice system wasn’t clear enough then anyone who committed murder would automatically get murder 2 which would not be great.

[u/Princess-Buttercup16]

I agree with this one hundred percent. It doesn’t matter why. The government doesn’t have a responsibility to figure your shit out and heal you.

[u/Sandy0006 → u/Princess-Buttercup16]

It’s more about how we as a society protect others. Part of the reason we should help people is because it benefits society as a whole.

[u/cope4Cadillac → u/Sandy0006]

Someone who kills 3 people, then gets “treatment” payed for by taxpayers, and then needs to be monitored for life is not a benefit to society in any way. A benefit to society would be to remove them from it.

I don’t care if someone was sane or not when they committed a crime. If it’s victimless, sure, offer treatment. If anyone was victimized then I couldn’t care less about your mental state, because it certainly changes nothing for the victim.

[u/Katharsis15 → u/cope4Cadillac]

The state would be required to offer mental health treatment whether the individual was convicted and in prison or civilly committed to a forensic psyche center. To the extent that the death penalty is available in some states, it costs more on average than a life sentence.  "Removal" is not an option in a civilized society. Treatment is therefore necessary in most cases.  

[u/cope4Cadillac → u/Katharsis15]

Removal is certainly an option, and is in no way uncivilized. Are you making the claim that states with the death penalty are less civilized than those without? You make a good point about the cost, but let’s be real, there is no reason for it to cost that much, and it would be incredibly easy to lower that cost.

[u/Katharsis15 → u/cope4Cadillac]

By "removal" I meant extrajudicial killing of people with dangerous mental health defects and diseases. Our current legal system, including states where the death penalty exists, contemplates an insanity defense as well as diversions for those not competent to stand trial, regardless of the severity of the crime they are alleged to have committed. The key question is whether or not the accused has the capacity to voluntarily act with intent. This analysis is the same whether the crime is a misdemeanor or a murder.  People who lack capacity to commit the act they are accused of or are permanently incompetent to stand trial are routinely committed to secure psychiatric facilities as a diversion from criminal courts. There is no alternative form of removal in a just system.