Opinion ID: 878340
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Volitionally-Impaired Defendant

Text: The test of mental disease or defect that was afforded defendants prior to 1979 read as follows: A person is not responsible for criminal conduct if at the time of such conduct as a result of mental disease or defect he is unable either to appreciate the criminality of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirements of the law. Section 46-14-101, MCA (1978). It is the second prong of this standard, the volitional aspect of mental disease or defect, that appellant claims has been eliminated. He argues that there are those who lack the ability to conform their conduct to the law and that elimination of the involuntariness defense is unconstitutional. The volitional aspect of mental disease or defect has not been eliminated from our criminal law. Consideration of a defendant's ability to conform his conduct to the law has been moved from the jury to the sentencing judge. The United States Supreme Court found in Leland, 343 U.S. at 801, 72 S.Ct. at 1008, that the irresistible impulse test of insanity was not implicit in the concept of ordered liberty. Additionally, the minimum requirements of any criminal offense are still a voluntary act and companion mental state. Section 45-2-202, MCA, provides that [a] material element of every offense is a voluntary act... . This Court has not judicially recognized the automatism defense. Applications of the defense may exist where a defendant acts during convulsions, sleep, unconsciousness, hypnosis or seizures. See, People v. Grant (1978), 71 Ill.2d 551, 17 Ill.Dec. 814, 377 N.E.2d 4. Our criminal code's provisions requiring a voluntary act and defining involuntary conduct adequately provide for such defenses. See sections 45-2-202 and 45-2-101(31), MCA. To the extent that the 1979 criminal code revisions allegedly eliminated the defense of insanity-induced volitional impairment, we find no abrogation of a constitutional right.