Opinion ID: 793602
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Ohio's Insanity Defense

Text: 208 Ohio's definition of insanity applicable to Lundgren's trial was, according to the state's Supreme Court, more liberal to those accused of crime than the traditional M'Naghten rule, State v. Staten, 18 Ohio St.2d 13, 247 N.E.2d 293, 295 (1969), and was defined as follows: 2 209 1. One accused of criminal conduct is not responsible for such criminal conduct if, at the time of such conduct, as a result of mental disease or defect, he does not have the capacity either to know the wrongfulness of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirements of law .... 210 2. In order to establish the defense of insanity where raised by plea in a criminal proceeding, the accused must establish by a preponderance of the evidence that disease or other defect of his mind had so impaired his reason that, at the time of the criminal act with which he is charged, either he did not know that such act was wrong or he did not have the ability to refrain from doing that act. 211 State v. Luff, 85 Ohio App.3d 785, 621 N.E.2d 493, 498 (1993) (quoting Staten, 247 N.E.2d at 294 (syllabus by the court)). Thus, Ohio law's definition of insanity had two elements: (1) mental disease or defect, and (2) a corresponding incapacity either to know the wrongfulness of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirements of law. Id. The Supreme Court of Ohio has emphasized that insanity is an issue for the jury to decide and that [t]he weight to be given the evidence and the credibility of the witnesses concerning the establishment of the defense of insanity in a criminal proceeding are primarily for the trier of the facts. State v. Thomas, 70 Ohio St.2d 79, 434 N.E.2d 1356, 1357-58 (1982); see also Ake v. Oklahoma, 470 U.S. 68, 81, 105 S.Ct. 1087, 84 L.Ed.2d 53 (1985) (Perhaps because there often is no single, accurate psychiatric conclusion on legal insanity in a given case, juries remain the primary factfinders on this issue . . . .); Paul H. Robinson, Criminal Law § 9.3 (1997) (What constitutes a mental disease or defect is a question for the jury.); State v. McDaniel, No. 18805, 1998 WL 887184, at  (Ohio Ct.App. Dec. 16, 1998) (insanity plea in deific decree case presented to jury); Perkey v. Cardwell, 369 F.Supp. 770, 771 (S.D.Ohio 1973), aff'd, 492 F.2d 1244 (6th Cir.1974) (insanity plea in deific decree case presented to trier of fact). 212 The following two sections apply both elements of Ohio's definition of insanity to the Lundgren case and conclude that a jury could have justifiably considered Lundgren legally insane.