San Francisco's Mayor Moscone was shot and killed
(by a fellow council member) and his defense used
the 'Twinkie' excuse to get him off.

(He had had a Twinkie for lunch, so the defense
was he was over-sugared and not responsible.)

After that, everyone wanted to be tried inside
city limits.

Nah, I don't think so Harm. You're probably right about the controversy over the terminology, that always happens. But whatever we lable it, I hope people will always have help available to them when they need it.

Yeah, the trouble is, is that most Psychologists are more crazy than the people they're treating.

Only the uneducated will make off the cuff disparaging remarks.

To do Social work,as in CPS, it's taught to be able to identify potential dangerous behaviors to decide whether or not to remove or leave the child.

In insanity pleas, money talks and can afford the best shrinks to give the evaluation they seek.

IMO, if a person is sentenced to the cracker factory, they should receive help. Then, imprisoned for their crimes.

Kill somebody that trying to rape u is a self depense but kill someone that you think that he or she as an allien you definitely insane:D

not if they are aliens...

Bipolar can cause hallucinations though Dodo. I have a friend who deals with that.

I disagree with you here MoeMan. Laws are there to correct and deter. If the guy was in an altered state, which he clearly was, then punishing him when he's in his right state of mind will not deter anything, because he's not likely going to do it again AS LONG AS HE STAYS ON HIS MEDS. This is where I take issue. Somebody who has an illness that causes them to kill someone needs to be mandated to take meds. I understand the argument against that, but if they force sexual predators to be chemically castrated, surely it's arguable that a violent schizophrenic needs should mandated to also. His meds... not the chemical castration part. Sorry to all you men who are wincing and cringing at the word

So if we punish the guy who didn't really know what he was doing, we're just getting revenge. That's not what the justice system is supposed to be about.

yea, thats just to liberal for me... way to many people get off on crimes because of what you just said... "i didn't mean to kill them, my mental illness made me do it"... to me, Thats BS... revenge or not, a crime was committed... they should just excuse it? to me, it's not an excuse, everyone has some sort of mental illness, according to the psychiatrists version of whats an illness... to them, an alcholic has a disease, a mental illness... should everyone that drinks to much be let off? "sorry, my mom didn't pay enough attention to me as a kid, that's why i shot 14 people"... people that do drugs, should they not be responsible for their actions? if people don't wanna do the time, then they shouldn't do the crime, crazy or not...

no one should be mandated to take any drugs, no matter what...

No, I don't think it should be excused either. I do think it should be looked at in a case by case manner, and there has to be a gooood deal of time spent in intensive therapy. I think the way a criminal gets a parole hearing should apply in cases where mental illness has been the cause of a horrible crime.

I can tell this is a hot topic for you. I think if it was as simple as "if you don't want to do the time", there would be no problem. In my mind it is akin to asking you to drink two cases of beer and then do logic puzzles. Schizophrenia isn't a state of mind where a person knows what is real and what is not. To them, it is absolutely real and they are living it. "Behave yourself" sometimes isn't an option.

I'm not saying they should get off scott free, but I think they need a different kind of accountability.

don't get me wrong, i don't have a "kill them all attitude", but think about a case by case basis... a rich kid with parents that have some pull would more than likely get off because of the power and money they're parents have... a poor person with nothing to be gained by anyone would not... it might not be that way in Canada, but it is that way here. i'm more of a "let nature take it's course" type, meaning the laws are the laws, and everyone should be dealt with the same...

if the doctors/courts really cared, then more would be done for everyone before a crime happens, not after people are hurt or dead...

and the psychotropic drugs that people are forced to take? every one of the mass shootings out here were done while they were on these types of drugs...

I agree with Mighty Moe on this well said.

Looks like, according to libs, Jeffrey was insane and should have been drugged and forced to go vegan.

This is actually the reason for the mental competency assessment legal requirement that the patient must first be in distress to even have any kind of disorder, no matter what they do, no matter how crazy other people think it is. Even if it's having sex with chicken guts, unless they're in distress doing it, like they think something is making them do it, then they're perfectly healthy and simply criminal if they commit a crime. Not insane. It all comes down to whether you are doing what you want to do or not, when you do something offensive or illegal.

As it should be.

The truth is the reality of biochemistry means that your own body can literally force you to act in a way and respond to things in a way which you do not want to do when challenged or asked. Biochemistry controls your emotions, and how you view things. Your personal goalposts of right and wrong are set by a consistent biochemistry, throw it out of wack and you can only try to remember where those goalposts were.
It's all demonstrated by testable results of reproducible physical experimentation and observation in nature (MRI, etc.).

Dr.Phil for example!

Let me put it this way, because people in this thread seem to have no idea what either the medical or legal definition of a clinical psychological disorder actually is, but seems to really get off on all the utter and complete fiction that fills television and news media about everything, everything, everything in america or about people. Pure fiction, utter tripe is what people seem to believe, and they apparently got it off an episode of CSI, complete and utter tripe and fiction, intentionally I might add, scripts/SFX/dialogue written by...wait for it: fiction writers.

Like D. U. H.

Are all Americans basically Homer Simpson?

The patient must be in distress to have any kind of mental disorder.
If they're not in distress, they don't have a disorder.
Yes it really is just that simple, both by law and medical association boards ethics committees (meaning by another law just as threatening to a doctor as criminal law).

See what this means, if you examine the words like ever when you read things so you actually learn something other than sales pitches for a change, when a person is at ease, at home, relaxed, with friends, under no threat or danger or unusual environmental nor any other kind of circumstances whatsoever, they're still in visible distress.
It might be a social anxiety disorder.
It could be sociopathy.
Perhaps they simply need to go to the toilet really really bad. We don't know, you'd have to ask them.

You'd have to ask them.

And that my friends, is the actually definition of whether or not someone has any kind of disoder. Of any sort.

I agree with Mightymoe
Too often we excuse those who use being a nutcase as a reason to hurt others.

Actually, bipolar sufferers can have psychotic episodes, so I think you're getting your facts a bit wrong there.

My sister is a psychiatric nurse and her husband also works with mental patients. I've had first hand experience with extremely mentally disturbed people myself and I just think that there's a lot of ignorant rubbish being talked in this thread. You try dealing with a paranoid schizophrenic that's completely delusional and then say that they should be treated like criminals and that it makes no difference if they are sane or not. I knew a guy that thought that everyone in his neighborhood was out to get him and when the police got involved and it went to court he told me that he could prove it because he had taken photographs and that the look on their faces was evidence that he was going to rely on in court.

In reality, prisons are full of people that shouldn't really be there and should be in hospital instead and I'm not talking about drinkers and drug addicts.

And saying that they should be in prison because if they could afford an expensive lawyer that they would have more chance of getting off? What sort of lame argument is that? Let's just get rid of the lawyers then and go back to lynch mobbing. I bet that would make a lot of you people happy.