M'Naghten Rule

The M'Naghten rule (pronounced, and sometimes spelled, McNaughton) is any variant of the 1840s jury instruction in a criminal case when there is a defense of insanity: The rule was formulated as a reaction to the acquittal in 1843 of Daniel M'Naghten on the charge of murdering Edward Drummond, whom M'Naghten had mistaken for UK Prime Minister Robert Peel. M'Naghten fired a pistol at the back of Peel's secretary, Edward Drummond, who died five days later. The House of Lords asked a panel of judges, presided over by Sir Nicolas Conyngham Tindal, Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, a series of hypothetical questions about the defence of insanity. The principles expounded by this panel have come to be known as the M'Naghten Rules, though they have gained any status only by usage in the common law and M'Naghten himself would have been found guilty if they had been applied at his trial. The rules so formulated as M'Naghten's Case 1843 10 C & F 200 have been a standard test for criminal liability in relation to mentally disordered defendants in common law jurisdictions ever since, with some minor adjustments. When the tests set out by the Rules are satisfied, the accused may be adjudged 'not guilty by reason of insanity' or 'guilty but insane' and the sentence may be a mandatory or discretionary (but usually indeterminate) period of treatment in a secure hospital facility, or otherwise at the discretion of the court (depending on the country and the offence charged) instead of a punitive disposal. The insanity defence is recognized in Australia, Canada, England and Wales, Hong Kong, India, the Republic of Ireland, New Zealand, Norway and most U.S. states with the exception of Idaho, Kansas, Montana, Utah, and Vermont but not all of these jurisdictions still use the M'Naghten Rules. There are various justifications for the exemption of the insane from criminal responsibility. When mental incapacity is successfully raised as a defence in a criminal trial it absolves a defendant from liability: it applies public policies in relation to criminal responsibility by applying a rationale of compassion, accepting that it is morally wrong to punish a person if that person is deprived permanently or temporarily of the capacity to form a necessary mental intent that the definition of a crime requires. Punishment of the obviously mentally ill by the state may undermine public confidence in the penal system. A utilitarian and humanitarian approach suggests that the interests of society are better served by treatment of the illness rather than punishment of the individual. Historically, insanity was seen as grounds for leniency. In pre-Norman times in England there was no distinct criminal code – a murderer could pay compensation to the victim's family under the principle of 'buy off the spear or bear it'. The insane person's family were expected to pay any compensation and look after. In Norman times insanity was not seen as a defence in itself but a special circumstance in which the jury would deliver a guilty verdict and refer the defendant to the King for a pardon In R v Arnold 1724 16 How St. Tr. 765, the test for insanity was expressed in the following terms The next major advance occurred in Hadfield's Trial 1800 27 How St. Tr. 765 in which the court decided that a crime committed under some delusion would be excused only if it would have been excusable had the delusion been true. This would deal with the situation, for example, when the accused imagines he is cutting through a loaf of bread, whereas in fact he is cutting through a person's neck.