Court Opinion

ID: 9725194
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 11:34:20.291115+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:25:12.393483
License: Public Domain

Dieterich, J.
(dissenting in part). I agree with the majority of this court that no evidence should be excluded which reasonably tends to show the mental condition of the defendant at the time of the offense. The majority does not however, liberalize the M’Naghten rule sufficiently to allow instruction to the jury which would permit the jury to use the full range of evidence before it. This incongruity could, in large measure, be eliminated by the addition to the M’Naghten rule, as modified, an additional clause incorporating the irresistible-impulse test.1 The rule as thus broadened would be more consistent with the admission of all relevant evidence of the defendant’s mental condition at the time of the offense and would require instructions to the jury consistent with the evidence before it.

 I would suggest the following modification of the M’Naghten rule: The term insanity in the law means such an abnormal condition of the mind, from any cause, as to render the defendant (1) incapable of understanding the nature and quality of the alleged wrongful act, or (2) incapable of distinguishing between right and wrong with respect to such act, or (3) incapable of preventing himself from committing the wrongful act.
See State v. White (1954), 58 N. M. 324, 270 Pac. (2d) 727.