Two major trials kicking off 2015 feature defendants invoking the insanity defense. For many, this adds to the myth that insanity is commonly used and frequently successful.
But in fact, the insanity defense is raised in less than 1% of felony cases, and it’s only successful in a fraction of those. Moreover, defendants judged to have been legally insane at the time of the offense and subsequently found not guilty by reason of insanity are in almost all cases indefinitely committed to psychiatric hospitals for treatment.
Statistically speaking, for those who want to see some guilty verdicts in the trials of James Holmes or Eddie Routh, they are likely to get their wish.
The legal standard for insanity varies across America, with each state free to apply any number of tests developed over the last centuries. While it may seem strange to have patchwork law among the states on an apparent issue of science, according to the U.S. Supreme Court, that’s exactly how it was intended to be.
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