Court Opinion

ID: 9471068
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 03:24:39.068264+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:42:15.729358
License: Public Domain

CUDAHY, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
Judge Eschbach, for the majority, has performed a remarkable feat of research and analysis in tracing the history of the Supreme Court consideration of the issues before us. Since the Court has said relatively little on these issues, we must give careful consideration to Fisher v. United States, 328 U.S. 463, 66 S.Ct. 1318, 90 L.Ed. 1382 (1946), Coleman v. California, 317 U.S. 596, 63 S.Ct. 162, 87 L.Ed. 487 (1942), and Troche v. California, 280 U.S. 524, 50 S.Ct. 87, 74 L.Ed. 592 (1929). At the same time, our understanding of these cases must be informed by the subsequent Supreme Court decisions in Washington v. Texas, 388 U.S. 14, 87 S.Ct. 1920, 18 L.Ed.2d 1019 (1967), and Chambers v. Mississippi, 410 U.S. 284, 93 S.Ct. 1038, 35 L.Ed.2d 297 (1973). In both Washington and Chambers, the Court broke new ground in evaluating state evidentiary rules that exclude evidence offered by criminal defendants. At the very least, these cases hold that a state may not arbitrarily or mechanistically define the uses to which relevant and competent evidence may be put. Washington v. Texas, 388 U.S. at 25, 87 S.Ct. at 1926 (Harlan, J., concurring); Chambers v. Mississippi, 410 U.S. at 302, 93 S.Ct. at 1049. Given the more recent teachings of Washington and Chambers, I cannot agree that Troche, Coleman and Fisher are dispositive of the question presented in the instant case.
I.
It seems to me that we must face up to assessing the validity of Wisconsin’s position — articulated in Steele v. State, 97 Wis.2d 72, 294 N.W.2d 2, 13 (1980), and other cases — that psychiatric testimony is relevant and competent to make the “gross evaluation” whether the defendant is sane, that is, of sufficiently sound mind to be criminally responsible; but that such testimony is not relevant or competent for the “fine tuning”, necessary to assess capacity to form an intent of the sort demanded by the criminal law. See supra at 24-25. Is this distinction as to use one that we can accept without infringing on a defendant’s right to present reliable evidence in his own defense? Or, is it arbitrary and therefore unconstitutional?
I agree that in this highly speculative area, where the potentialities of psychiatry are elusive, we must give careful consideration to the proposition that Wisconsin should, without offending the Constitution, be permitted to draw the distinction it does. Moreover, I believe that our view of the extent to which Hughes v. Mathews, 576 F.2d 1250 (7th Cir.), cert, dismissed sub nom., Israel v. Hughes, 439 U.S. 801, 99 S.Ct. 43, 58 L.Ed.2d 94 (1978), controls the case before us can and should be guided by the explications of state law contained in Steele and in like cases decided since Hughes. See, e.g., State v. Dalton, 98 Wis.2d 725, 298 N.W.2d 398 (1980).
For several reasons, however, I do not think the “gross” versus “fine tuning” distinction withstands careful analysis. Therefore, since — as I understand the Supreme Court — the burden is on the state to justify the exclusion for certain uses of evidence it otherwise deems reliable, I am impelled to reach a conclusion which the majority rejects.
First, the state’s assertion that it must exclude expert testimony on the defendant’s mens rea lest this testimony interfere with the jury’s determination of specific intent to kill seems inconsistent with its willingness to allow the jury to hear all manner of testimony on the very same subject without any expert component. For example, in Steele:
Extensive psychiatric and personal history in respect to Steele was introduced without objection by the defense at the guilt phase of the trial. It showed that he had a long history of psychiatric and social problems, that he had been placed in an institution for disturbed children, and that he had been in a boys school and in four foster homes. He spent more than a year in Mendota State Hospital *1146beginning in 1960. He enlisted in the Navy in 1963; but after five weeks in a regular unit he was placed in a psychiatric unit, and he was subsequently discharged. Upon discharge, he was readmitted to Mendota State Hospital. There was also evidence to show that Steele was a compulsive gambler and that he had gone on at least five gambling binges at Las Vegas. The purpose of all of this evidence was to cast doubt upon the defendant’s intent to kill. This evidence, offered for the purpose of rebutting the presumption, was admitted with no objection by the state.
Steele, 294 N.W.2d at 5. If this evidence has value for the jury in understanding the defendant’s intent — and the Steele opinion acknowledged that it has, see id: at 6 n. 2, 7 n. 3 — it is hard to understand why a psychiatrist’s insights would be worthless Or exceptionally confusing.
Second, the state’s broad exclusionary rule apparently will have the effect of excluding certain psychiatric testimony which would appear to be of exceptional value in clarifying the mens rea issues for the jury. For example, in Commonwealth v. Walzack, 468 Pa. 210, 360 A.2d 914 (1976), a defendant offered psychiatric testimony to prove that as a result of a lobotomy operation, he lacked the capacity to form the specific intent to kill. It would seem that a psychiatrist could offer unique, and perhaps invaluable, insights to the jury regarding the thought processes of an individual who has undergone a lobotomy. Similarly, in People v. Wells, 33 Cal.2d 330, 202 P.2d 53, cert, denied, 338 U.S. 836, 70 S.Ct. 43, 94 L.Ed. 510 (1949), a defendant charged with assaulting a prison guard “with malice aforethought” offered psychiatric testimony to explain his abnormally low threshold of fear which caused him to believe he was acting in self-defense. Again, a psychiatrist’s testimony on the nature of such a defendant’s mental defects would seem to be helpful. Steele can be read as excluding such obviously useful psychiatric testimony.
In this connection, the Steele court rejected the position that the admission of psychiatric testimony on intent should be left to the discretion of the trial court. This position was advocated by Justice Abrahamson, dissenting in Steele. It is also a position advocated by Professors Frank Remington and Walter Dickey of the University of Wisconsin Law School in a thought-provoking amicus brief filed in these cases. And it is a position which addresses many of the problems ascribed to Wisconsin’s blanket exclusion. See Note, Restricting the Admission of Psychiatric Testimony on a Defendant’s Mental State: Wisconsin’s Steele Curtain, 1981 Wis.L.Rev. 733, 767-70 (suggesting guidelines for a case by case approach).
Third, although the state asserted a distinction between expert testimony on mens rea capacity and expert testimony with respect to insanity, the Wisconsin Supreme Court also made the point that the former sort of testimony was “substantially congruent with evidence supportive of the ... test for insanity to be utilized in the second phase of the bifurcated trial.... Both tests focus on exactly the same mental defect — lack of capacity.” Steele, 294 N.W.2d at 9. But this observation seems to suggest that insanity and mens rea incapacity are merely labels for the same disorganization of mind and personality; therefore, the evidentiary analysis with respect to one may very well virtually duplicate the analysis of the other.
A comparison of a psychiatrist’s testimony on criminal intent and criminal responsibility [sanity] suggests that the concepts to which the psychiatrist is asked to speak in either area are substantively the same. A psychiatrist testifying to mental responsibility is allowed to state his opinion as to whether or not, at the time of committing the crime, the defendant “lacked substantial capacity either to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct or conform his conduct to the requirements of law.” A psychiatrist asked to testify on criminal intent in a first-degree murder trial states his opinion as to whether the defendant, at the time of committing the crime, had the mental capacity to form the intent to kill.
In both instances the reliability of a psychiatrist’s testimony depends on his *1147expertise in evaluating the defendant’s reasoning capacity in a prior mental state. The Steele opinion itself found that the standards for establishing insanity and lack of capacity to intent are “very similar.” Psychiatric testimony on similar concepts might be assumed to carry similar expectations of reliability.
Note, supra, 1981 Wis.L.Rev. at 761-62 (footnotes omitted).
Therefore, I find the state’s justifications for its position unpersuasive and, on the basis of Hughes, Chambers and Washington, I would grant the writs.
II.
Of course, I recognize one very practical consideration which sometimes argues against the admission of psychiatric evidence to prove impaired capacity to form an intent:
Where, as in Wisconsin, the statutes provide that a person found not guilty by reason of insanity is to be committed to a mental treatment facility until recovered and until his return to society presents no danger to the public, the introduction of evidence of mental condition on the question of impaired capacity to form intent during the guilt phase of the trial could well be required to acquit the defendant, sane or insane, without ever inquiring into the issue of sanity and without regard to the provisions of the statute requiring treatment of those pleading and establishing insanity.
State v. Hebard, 50 Wis.2d 408, 184 N.W.2d 156, 162 (1971).
In Hughes v. Mathews, the state advanced these considerations (or variants of them) as one justification for excluding psychiatric testimony on the issue of specific intent. In Hughes, we rejected this justification as unpersuasive since the psychiatric evidence in Hughes was offered only to prove that a conviction of second-degree murder rather than of first-degree murder was proper because specific intent to kill was allegedly lacking. The Hughes panel expressly left open the question of admissibility of psychiatric evidence where this kind of evidence could result in an acquittal. Nonetheless, there is an underlying belief that those who commit deadly acts of violence should either be punished by lengthy incarceration in a penal institution or treated for as long a time as may be necessary to be cured in a mental institution. The prospect of psychiatric evidence resulting in the immediate release into society of a presumably dangerous defendant must be one important factor in the state’s effort to carefully control the admission of evidence. One can hardly quarrel with the state’s concerns in this respect although, in the cases at bar, these concerns are at one remove — as they were in Hughes — since the defendants presumably would be convicted of, and incarcerated for, the lesser included offense.
The basic problem in the cases before us is probably not that specific intent is more difficult to assess psychiatrically than sanity. The basic problem may be that, under many circumstances, a psychiatrist may not be able to give a reliable opinion as to what the mental condition of the defendant was at the time the crime was committed. See W. Winslade & J. Ross, The Insanity Plea at 217 (Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York 1983). Testimony as to a past state of mind of the defendant may therefore be of dubious reliability whether it relates to insanity or to intent. The distinction which I think deserves study is not between psychiatric evidence on capacity to form an intent and such evidence on insanity but between current clinical assessment and speculation as to a past state of mind.1 So too a problem exists where judges permit psychiatrists to speak to the ultimate legal issue. See Note, supra, 1981 Wis.L.Rev. at 764-67.
*1148Perhaps we can begin with the proposition that what psychiatry knows, or ought to know, best is current clinical observations, with emphasis on assessment of treat-ability and provision of treatment. See Winslade & Ross, supra at 225. A psychiatrist ought to be able to size up the general state of a subject’s mental malfunctioning, to describe and hopefully classify his affliction and to locate the subject’s irrationalities on a scale of severity. A psychiatrist may also have a view of how easily the mental ailment in question will yield to treatment, what sort of treatment is indicated, how long therapy will take and how successful it is likely to be.2
What may follow from this estimate of psychiatry’s capabilities is the notion that there may be a need for a new approach to the way in which mental illness is acknowledged and responded to by our criminal justice system. The authors of The Insanity Plea, supra, suggest, for example, that issues of mental illness should be reserved for a “disposition” phase of a criminal adjudication. Further, the authors recommend that mental illness be viewed as a “more or less” rather than an “all or nothing” proposition. The object of the disposition phase would be to apportion the defendant’s sentence between treatment for his mental illness and incarceration as punishment for his crime: “the less sane would receive more treatment, while the more sane someone is, the more punishment he would receive.” Winslade & Ross, supra at 220. Obviously, there could be many questions— some fundamental — about such a procedure, but the time may be upon us to ask questions boldly.
I recognize that I have strayed from the issues presented by this record. But the issues directly presented here, as well as those suggested by the analysis, are of immense seriousness and difficulty and have wide ramifications for the administration of justice. Given the strong teaching of Hughes, given the record before us (which does not raise what I think may be some fundamental problems associated with the insanity defense — or its variants), and given the other factors to which I have briefly adverted, I cannot join the majority — much as I empathize with its efforts to dispose fairly of an extraordinarily perplexing problem.
Hence, I must respectfully dissent.

. “Skepticism as to the expertise of psychiatrists to speak to past mental states of criminal defendants, and a concern for the inability of a judge or jury to discern when a psychiatrist has gone beyond his expertise, supports the Steele court’s decision to return to the total exclusion of all psychiatric evidence on intent. However, these concerns justify the exclusion of all psychiatric testimony on a defendant’s past mental state, not merely the exclusion of psychiatric testimony on intent.” Note, supra, 1981 Wis.L. Rev. at 760.

. It is opinions and assessments related to these issues, perhaps, which Justice (now Chief Justice) Heffernan had in mind when in Steele he spoke of a psychiatrist’s “gross evaluation that a person’s conduct and mental state is so beyond the limits of accepted norms that to hold him criminally responsible would be unjust.” Steele, 294 N.W.2d at 13. Such a “gross evaluation” in terms of sanity and insanity is in the view of the Wisconsin Supreme Court the sort of task that expert testimony can legitimately undertake.