Comparative Justice Systems Classification Analysis

Criminal Justice in Norway, England and United States

Janelle Dean

CRJ613: Comparative Criminal Justice Systems (SCH1727A)

Instructor’s name: Chastity Miller

Date submitted: 7/7/2017

Criminal Justice in Norway, England and United States

The insanity defense commonly known as the mental disorder defense in different jurisdictions is a defense of excuse. The defense is based on the conception that the defendant rather offender is not responsible for the crimes they committed because they did them under the control or influence of some psychiatric diseases. This type of excuse defense is in contrast with the excuse of provocation where the penalties of the crimes committed are reduced based on the temporary mental state of the offenders (Leichter, 2014). It is also different from the case where the defendant cannot stand trial because they have mental disorders or disabilities that cannot allow them to help the councils in the case. Exceptions from prosecution based on the rule of excuse defense can be traced from prehistorically time during the reign of the Code of Hammurabi in Greek. There are several legal definitions that can be used to back insanity or mental disorder defense and they include the following M'Naghten Rule, the Durham rule, the 1953 British Royal Commission on Capital Punishment report, the ALI rule (American Legal Institute Model Penal Code rule), and the famous mens rea (guilty mind) (Slobogin, 2016). This paper will compare insanity defense in England, Norway as compared to the American one.

Criminal Justice in Norway, England and United States

In England, insanity defense an only be admissible in the criminal proceedings if the defendant is able to prove that they were unable to understand what they were doing at the time they committed crimes of they did not understand what they were doing was not right or rater lawful. Insanity defense in the English law is practiced or it is allowed in two forms; the first form is when the criminal act was done when the defendant was insane or the defendant is insane at the time of prosecution (Leichter, 2014). In the first instance, the defendant has to prove that he or she was suffering from a disease that damaged their mental state at the time they committed the crimes or he or she did not understand what they were doing was wrong unlike in the united states and Norway where it is based on specific rules and medical principles respectively (Slobogin, 2016). Another instance where the insanity defense is used is when the defendant cannot differentiate between guilty and not guilty plea.

The procedures that guide these instances are enshrined in the Criminal Procedure (Insanity) Act 1964, although the law gives the judges discretion to determine the procedures of the case. The most popular case that has been used to refer to the insanity defense is the case of Daniel M’Naghten who attempted to assassinate the prime minister of the United Kingdom but he ended up killing Edward Drummond who was the secretary of the Prime Minister Peel (Slobogin, 2016). He was arrested and charged on 3 March 1843and both the parties agreed that the accused was insane and the case was reduced to determining what insanity constituted. The judges concluded that every one remain sane until proven otherwise by his or her acts. And this constituted the famous M’Naghten rules which have been adopted even by America as one of its insanity tests.

The Norwegian criminal law is different from the English and is one of the very few in different jurisdictions in the world that observe what is termed as the medical principle. The principle implies that a person can only be regarded as insane if the person can prove that is under diagnosis that involves active psychosis cases (Moore, 2015). Under Norwegian criminal justice, one can therefore be allowed to rely on the excuse defense or the insanity defense if they are able to prove that they were unable to control their criminal acts because they were under the state of psychosis. The legal criteria for one to be regarded insane is based on psychosis, unconsciousness, or severe mental retardation (Leichter, 2014). The motivation of understanding the actions of the offender does not matter in the case of the Norway penal law. In the case of Norway, one has to establish the connection between the crimes committed and their mental state.

The Norwegian insane defense is based on the precedence that were set in the ruling that involved the case of Anders Behring Breivik a terrorist who killed 77 people and injured many more people in Norway. In the case, the defendant admitted that he was not a psychiatric case but he was insane (Moore, 2015). This case raised a lot debate in Norway and which elicited much concerned on the state of Norwegian forensic psychiatry; its practices, methods, framework, conditions and whether the insanity rules in the penal law are even valid. The case set a judicial precedence on which insanity cases in Norway have been based on to today.

Contrary to the English and Norway laws on insanity defense, the American laws on excuse defense or insanity defense can be admissible by pleading to insanity in both federal and state law courts except in the states of Idaho, Kansas, Montana, and Utah that also base their insanity defense on the principle of medicine just like in Norway (Slobogin, 2016). The American criminal justice system base its insanity test on the M’Naghten test which is based on the case of Daniel M’Naghten in 1843, the Durham/ New Hampshire test which give the offender a chance for acquittal if the acts were as a result of mental illness (Leichter, 2014). The test is based on the ruling of the case between Durham v. United States, the model penal code test which s based on the strict M’Naghten rule and the lenient Durham rule that was published by the American law institute.

Conclusion

In America unlike in England and Norway, insanity defense is also based on the terms of the insanity defense reform act of 1984 which originated from the president Reagan assignation attempt case. The case of the case of insanity of defense in America that has been debated for a long time is the case that involved a person who tried to assassinate President Reagan of the United States. The case was a landmark as it shifted the burden of proof that the offender was insane from the prosecutor to the defenders. The case reduced the scope of expert testimony in such cases and the ALI test was drop for a tougher M’Naghten rule.

References

Leichter, H. M. (2014). Free to be foolish: politics and health promotion in the United States and Great Britain. Princeton University Press.

Moore, M. S. (2015). The quest for a responsible responsibility test: Norwegian insanity law after Breivik. Criminal Law and Philosophy, 9(4), 645.

Slobogin, C. (2016). Eliminating Mental Disability as a Legal Criterion in Deprivation of Liberty Cases: The Impact of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities on the Insanity Defense, Civil Commitment, and Competency Law. Law & Psychol. Rev., 40, 297.