Opinion ID: 1290601
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: (1a) This court should adopt the American Law Institute test, as stated in section 4.01, subpart (1) of the Model Penal Code, to define the defense of insanity.

Text: The trial court instructed the jury that Legal insanity ... means a diseased or deranged condition of the mind which makes a person incapable of knowing or understanding the nature and quality of his act, or makes a person incapable of knowing or understanding that his act was wrong. [4] We explain that this instruction, based on the M'Naghten test, was erroneous, and on the record before us constitutes prejudicial error requiring reversal of the judgment. (2) The purpose of a legal test for insanity is to identify those persons who, owing to mental incapacity, should not be held criminally responsible for their conduct. The criminal law rests on a postulate of free will  that all persons of sound mind are presumed capable of conforming their behavior to legal requirements [5] and that when any such person freely chooses to violate the law, he may justly be held responsible. (See Goldstein, The Insanity Defense (1967) pp. 9-10.) From the earliest days of the common law, however, the courts have recognized that a few persons lack the mental capacity to conform to the strictures of the law. Thus in 1582 William Lambart of Lincoln's Inn wrote that If ... a mad man or a natural fool, or a lunatic in the time of his lunacy, or a child who apparently had no knowledge of good or evil, do kill a man, this is no felonious act ... for they cannot be said to have any understanding will. (Lambart, Eirenarcha (1582) Cat. 21.218. (Spelling modernized).) The principle that mental incapacity constitutes a defense to crime is today accepted in all American jurisdictions. (See Weihofen, Mental Disorder as a Criminal Defense (1954) p. 51.) The California Penal Code codifies the defense of mental incapacity. Section 20 states that [i]n every crime ... there must exist a union ... of act and intent. Section 21 provides as to persons of sound mind [t]he intent ... is manifested by the circumstances connected with the offense and that All persons are of sound mind who are neither idiots nor lunatics, nor affected with insanity. Finally section 26 specifies that All persons are capable of committing crimes except those belonging to the following classes and includes among those classes Idiots and Lunatics and insane persons. [6] (3) Although the Legislature has thus provided that insanity is a defense to a criminal charge, it has never attempted to define that term. The task of describing the circumstances under which mental incapacity will relieve a defendant of criminal responsibility has become the duty of the judiciary. Since People v. Coffman (1864) 24 Cal. 230, 235, the California courts have followed the M'Naghten rule to define the defense of insanity. The curious origin of the M'Naghten rule has been frequently recounted. (See, e.g., United States v. Freeman (2d Cir.1966) 357 F.2d 606, 616-617; Weihofen, Mental Disorder as a Criminal Defense, supra, pp. 59-63.) In 1843 Daniel M'Naghten, afflicted with paranoia, attempted to assassinate the Prime Minister of England, and succeeded in killing the Prime Minister's secretary. M'Naghten's acquittal on grounds of insanity so disturbed Queen Victoria that she summoned the House of Lords to obtain the opinion of the judges on the law of insanity. The 15 judges of the common law courts were called in an extraordinary session, under a not subtle atmosphere of pressure ( United States v. Freeman, supra, 357 F.2d 606, 617), to answer five hypothetical questions on the law of criminal responsibility. In response to two of the questions propounded the judges stated that to establish a defence on the ground of insanity, it must be clearly proved that, at the time of the committing the act, the party accused was labouring under such a defect of reason, from disease of the mind, as not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing; or, if he did know it, that he did not know he was doing what was wrong. ( M'Naghten's Case, supra, 10 Clark & Fin. 200, 210 [8 Eng. Rep. 718, 722].) Although an advisory opinion, and thus most questionable authority (see 2 Stephen, History of the Criminal Law of England (1883) p. 153), this language became the basis for the test of insanity in all American states except New Hampshire. (Weihofen, Mental Disorder as a Criminal Defense, supra, pp. 68-69.) Despite its widespread acceptance, the deficiencies of M'Naghten have long been apparent. Principal among these is the test's exclusive focus upon the cognitive capacity of the defendant, an outgrowth of the then current psychological theory under which the mind was divided into separate independent compartments, one of which could be diseased without affecting the others. (See United States v. Currens (3d Cir.1961) 290 F.2d 751, 766.) As explained by Judge Ely of the Ninth Circuit: The M'Naghten rules fruitlessly attempt to relieve from punishment only those mentally diseased persons who have no cognitive capacity.... This formulation does not comport with modern medical knowledge that an individual is a mentally complex being with varying degrees of awareness. It also fails to attack the problem presented in a case wherein an accused may have understood his actions but was incapable of controlling his behavior. Such a person has been allowed to remain a danger to himself and to society whenever, under M'Naghten, he is imprisoned without being afforded such treatment as may produce rehabilitation and is later, potentially recidivistic, released. ( Wade v. United States (9th Cir.1970) 426 F.2d 64, 66-67.) (Fns. omitted.) [7] M'Naghten's exclusive emphasis on cognition would be of little consequence if all serious mental illness impaired the capacity of the affected person to know the nature and wrongfulness of his action. Indeed, the early decision of People v. Hoin (1882) 62 Cal. 120, 123, in rejecting the defense of irresistible impulse, rested on this gratuitous but doubtful assumption. Current psychiatric opinion, however, holds that mental illness often leaves the individual's intellectual understanding relatively unimpaired, but so affects his emotions or reason that he is unable to prevent himself from committing the act. (See United States v. Smith (6th Cir.1968) 404 F.2d 720, 725.) [I]nsanity does not only, or primarily, affect the cognitive or intellectual faculties, but affects the whole personality of the patient, including both the will and the emotions. An insane person may therefore often know the nature and quality of his act and that it is wrong and forbidden by law, and yet commit it as a result of the mental disease. (Rep. Royal Com. on Capital Punishment, 1949-1953, p. 80.) The annals of this court are filled with illustrations of the above statement: the deluded defendant in People v. Gorshen, supra, 51 Cal.2d 716, who believed he would be possessed by devilish visions unless he killed his foreman; the schizophrenic boy in People v. Wolff, supra, 61 Cal.2d 795, who knew that killing his mother was murder but was unable emotionally to control his conduct despite that knowledge; the defendant in People v. Robles (1970) 2 Cal.3d 205 [85 Cal. Rptr. 166, 466 P.2d 710], suffering from organic brain damage, who mutilated himself and killed others in sudden rages. To ask whether such a person knows or understands that his act is wrong is to ask a question irrelevant to the nature of his mental illness or to the degree of his criminal responsibility. Secondly, M'Naghten's single track emphasis on the cognitive aspect of the personality recognizes no degrees of incapacity. Either the defendant knows right from wrong or he does not.... But such a test is grossly unrealistic.... As the commentary to the American Law Institute's Model Penal Code observes, `The law must recognize that when there is no black and white it must content itself with different shades of gray.' ( United States v. Freeman, supra, 357 F.2d 606, 618-619, quoting ALI, Model Pen. Code (Tent. Drafts, Nos. 1, 2, 3, and 4, p. 158.) In short, M'Naghten purports to channel psychiatric testimony into the narrow issue of cognitive capacity, an issue often unrelated to the defendant's illness or crime. The psychiatrist called as a witness faces a dilemma: either he can restrict his testimony to the confines of M'Naghten, depriving the trier of fact of a full presentation of the defendant's mental state (see United States v. Freeman, supra, 357 F.2d 606, 620; Durham v. United States, supra, 214 F.2d 862, 874), or he can testify that the defendant cannot tell right from wrong when that is not really his opinion because by so testifying he acquires the opportunity to put before the trier of fact the reality of defendant's mental condition. (See Brakel & Rock, The Mentally Disabled and the Law (2d ed. 1971) p. 387; Diamond, Criminal Responsibility of the Mentally Ill (1961) 14 Stan.L. Rev. 59, 60-61.) As Justice Frankfurter stated before the Royal Commission on Capital Punishment, I think to have rules which cannot rationally be justified except by a process of interpretation which distorts and often practically nullifies them ... is not a desirable system.... [T]he M'Naghten Rules are in large measure shams. That is a strong word, but I think the M'Naghten Rules are very difficult for conscientious people and not difficult enough for people who say `We'll just juggle them.' (Royal Com. on Capital Punishment, op.cit. supra, p. 102.) Even if the psychiatrist is able to place before the trier of fact a complete picture of the defendant's mental incapacity, that testimony reaches the trier of fact weakened by cross-examination designed to show that defendant knew right from wrong (see, for example, the cross-examination described in People v. Wolff, supra, 61 Cal.2d 795, 812-814) and limited by the M'Naghten instruction. As a result, conscientious juries have often returned verdicts of sanity despite plain evidence of serious mental illness and unanimous expert testimony that the defendant was insane. (See People v. Wolff, supra, 61 Cal.2d 795, 812 and cases there cited.) Conscious of the inadequacies of the M'Naghten test, California decisions have modified that test in two significant respects. First, in People v. Wolff, supra, 61 Cal.2d 795, we held that the mere capacity to verbalize socially acceptable answers to questions did not prove sanity; the defendant must not only know but also appreciate or understand the nature and wrongfulness of his act. (Pp. 800-801.) Second, in a series of decisions dating from People v. Wells (1949) 33 Cal.2d 330 [202 P.2d 53] and People v. Gorshen, supra, 51 Cal.2d 716, we developed the concept of diminished capacity, under which a defendant can introduce evidence of mental incapacity to negate specific intent, malice, or other subjective elements of the charged crime. Recently in People v. Cantrell (1973) 8 Cal.3d 672 [105 Cal. Rptr. 792, 504 P.2d 1256], we expressly held that irresistible impulse  a concept evolved to supply the volitional element lacking in the M'Naghten test  can be utilized to prove diminished capacity. (Pp. 685-686.) But these innovative modifications to the M'Naghten rule fail to cure its basic defects. Wolff ameliorates only one of the rigid categories of M'Naghten; as Professor Sherry explains: It still ... falls short of acknowledging the teaching of psychiatry that mental aberration may not only impair knowledge of wrongfulness but may very well destroy an individual's capacity to control or to restrain himself. (Sherry, Penal Code Revision Project  Progress Report (1968) 43 State Bar J. 900, 916.) The doctrine of diminished capacity, once hailed as a possible replacement for the defense of insanity (see Diamond, Criminal Responsibility of the Mentally Ill (1961) 14 Stan.L.Rev. 59), can now be seen to create its own problems. The availability of a defense of diminished capacity turns largely on the nature of the crime charged. If the defendant is charged with a general intent crime, he cannot raise a defense of diminished capacity regardless of his impaired mental state. ( People v. Noah (1971) 5 Cal.3d 469, 477 [96 Cal. Rptr. 441, 487 P.2d 1409]; People v. Nance (1972) 25 Cal. App.3d 925, 929 [102 Cal. Rptr. 266].) If charged with a specific intent crime, he may be able to reduce the offense to a lesser included general intent crime. If evidence of diminished capacity is used to negate criminal intent in a crime which contains no lesser offense, however, the defendant may secure his outright acquittal and release. (See Goldstein, The Insanity Defense, supra, pp. 201-202.) The effectiveness of the defense, and the disposition of the defendant, thus turn less on the nature and seriousness of the defendant's mental disability than on the technical structure of the criminal law. A defendant whose criminal activity arises from mental illness or defect usually requires confinement and special treatment. Penal Code sections 1026 and 1026a provide such confinement and treatment for persons acquitted on grounds of insanity. A successful diminished capacity defense, on the other hand, results either in the release of the defendant or his confinement as an ordinary criminal for a lesser term. Because the diminished capacity defense thus fails to identify the mentally disturbed defendant, it may result in the defendant's not receiving the care appropriate to his condition. Such a defendant, who may still suffer from his mental disturbance, may serve his term, be released and thus permitted to become a danger to the public. (See Goldstein, The Insanity Defense, supra, p. 202; Brakel & Rock, The Mentally Disabled and the Law, supra, p. 395.) In our opinion the continuing inadequacy of M'Naghten as a test of criminal responsibility cannot be cured by further attempts to interpret language dating from a different era of psychological thought, nor by the creation of additional concepts designed to evade the limitations of M'Naghten. It is time to recast M'Naghten in modern language, taking account of advances in psychological knowledge and changes in legal thought. The definition of mental incapacity appearing in section 4.01 of the American Law Institute's Model Penal Code represents the distillation of nine years of research, exploration, and debate by the leading legal and medical minds of the country. ( United States v. Freeman, supra, 357 F.2d 606, 622.) It specifies that A person is not responsible for criminal conduct if at the time of such conduct as a result of mental disease or defect he lacks substantial capacity either to appreciate the criminality [wrongfulness] of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirements of law. [8] Adhering to the fundamental concepts of free will and criminal responsibility, the American Law Institute test restates M'Naghten in language consonant with current legal and psychological thought. (Goldstein, The Insanity Defense, supra, p. 87.) It has won widespread acceptance, having been adopted by every federal circuit except for the first circuit [9] and by 15 states. [10] In the opinion of most thoughtful observers this proposed test [the ALI test] is a significant improvement over M'Naughton. ( People v. Kelly (1973) 10 Cal.3d 565, 581-582 [111 Cal. Rptr. 171, 516 P.2d 875] (Mosk, J. conc.).) The advantages may be briefly summarized. First, the ALI test adds a volitional element, the ability to conform to legal requirements, which is missing from the M'Naghten test. Second, it avoids the all-or-nothing language of M'Naghten and permits a verdict based on lack of substantial capacity. (See Blake v. United States, supra, 407 F.2d 908, 914; United States v. Shapiro, supra, 383 F.2d 680, 685.) Third, the ALI test is broad enough to permit a psychiatrist to set before the trier of fact a full picture of the defendant's mental impairments and flexible enough to adapt to future changes in psychiatric theory and diagnosis. Fourth, by referring to the defendant's capacity to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct the test confirms our holding in People v. Wolff, supra, 61 Cal.2d 795, that mere verbal knowledge of right and wrong does not prove sanity. Finally, by establishing a broad test of nonresponsibility, including elements of volition as well as cognition, the test provides the foundation on which we can order and rationalize the convoluted and occasionally inconsistent law of diminished capacity. (See discussion in Comment, Keeping Wolff From the Door: California's Diminished Capacity Concept (1972) 60 Cal.L.Rev. 1641, 1649; Comment, Diminished Capacity: Its Potential Effect in California (1970) 3 Loyola L.A.L.Rev. 153, 154.) In light of the manifest superiority of the ALI test, the only barrier to the adoption of that test we perceive lies in the repeated judicial declarations that any change in the M'Naghten rule requires legislative action. (See People v. Wolff, supra, 61 Cal.2d 795, 803; People v. Darling (1962) 58 Cal.2d 15, 23 [22 Cal. Rptr. 484, 372 P.2d 316]; People v. Rittger (1960) 54 Cal.2d 720, 732 [7 Cal. Rptr. 901, 355 P.2d 645]; People v. Nash, supra, 52 Cal.2d 36, 48-49; People v. Berry (1955) 44 Cal.2d 426, 433 [282 P.2d 861]; People v. Daugherty (1953) 40 Cal.2d 876, 894 [256 P.2d 911].) This pronouncement rests on two bases: the lengthy history of the M'Naghten rule in California (see People v. Daugherty, supra ) and the failure of the 1927 Legislature, when it revised the procedures for pleading and trying the defense of insanity, to overturn the M'Naghten test (see People v. Nash, supra ). The concept that an extended line of judicial decisions, accompanied by legislative inaction, can freeze the evolution of judicial principles, divesting the courts of authority to overturn their prior decisions, is not in good repute. In Li v. Yellow Cab Co. (1975) 13 Cal.3d 804 [119 Cal. Rptr. 858, 532 P.2d 1226, 78 A.L.R.3d 393], when we adopted a rule of comparative negligence, we rejected the argument that any change in the law of contributory negligence was a matter for the Legislature, and overturned more than a century of precedent. In Rodriguez v. Bethlehem Steel Corp. (1974) 12 Cal.3d 382 [115 Cal. Rptr. 765, 525 P.2d 669], we expressly repudiated the assertion that recognition of a spousal action for loss of consortium required legislative action (see pp. 393-395) and, overruling prior decisions, endorsed that cause of action. In fact the decision of Cole v. Rush (1955) 45 Cal.2d 345 [289 P.2d 450, 54 A.L.R.2d 1137], on which People v. Nash, supra, 52 Cal.2d 36, 43 relied for its theory that legislative failure to overturn M'Naghten immunized that doctrine from judicial revision, was itself overruled in Vesely v. Sager (1971) 5 Cal.3d 153, 167 [95 Cal. Rptr. 623, 486 P.2d 151]. (4) (See fn. 11.) The principle underlying the cited cases is that the judiciary has the responsibility for legal doctrine which it has created. [11] (See Rodriguez v. Bethlehem Steel Corp., supra, 12 Cal.3d 382, 393; People v. Pierce (1964) 61 Cal.2d 879, 882 [40 Cal. Rptr. 845, 395 P.2d 893].) The power of the court to reshape judicial doctrine does not authorize us to overturn constitutionally valid statutes. But as Justice Mosk explained in his concurring opinion in People v. Kelly, supra, 10 Cal.3d 565, 580, the M'Naghten rule is not an integral part of the statutory structure of California criminal law. The Legislature has never enacted the M'Naghten rule as a test of insanity, and its provisions relating to criminal responsibility do not incorporate the M'Naghten formula. (See Pen. Code, §§ 26, 1016, 1367.) Thus replacement of the M'Naghten rule with the ALI test will not contradict or nullify any legislative enactment. The concept expressed by some California courts, that any change must emanate from the Legislature, ignores the fact that the courts have already departed substantially from the M'Naghten formula. As we explained earlier, we rejected in People v. Wolff, supra, 61 Cal.2d 795, the portion of M'Naghten holding that a defendant who knows his act is wrong is sane, and held that he must understand or appreciate the wrongfulness of his act. We also created the doctrine of diminished capacity specifically to ameliorate the law governing criminal responsibility prescribed by the M'Naghten rule ( People v. Henderson (1963) 60 Cal.2d 482, 490 [35 Cal. Rptr. 77, 386 P.2d 677]), and included in that doctrine concepts of irresistible impulse which the M'Naghten test rejects. Thus adoption of the ALI rule does not represent a radical break from precedent, but simply an additional step in the constant revision and updating of the test of criminal responsibility to correspond to current legal and psychological thought. Five years ago Justice Mosk, in his concurring opinion in People v. Kelly, supra, 10 Cal.3d 565, 578, called upon this court to depart from the M'Naghten formulation and adopt the test proposed by the American Law Institute. (1b) For the foregoing reasons, derived in large part from the analysis in Justice Mosk's concurrence, we now conclude that the California courts should employ the ALI test to define the defense of insanity. [12] This decision will apply retroactively only to those cases not yet final in which the defendant has pled not guilty by reason of insanity and to cases that have not yet come to trial as of the date of the finality of this opinion.