Court Opinion

ID: 9450835
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 16:59:19.153344+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:32:28.532879
License: Public Domain

BURGER, Circuit Judge
(concurring in the result):
I agree with the affirmance of the conviction but I do not agree with the obiter dictum observations which are made up essentially of a recital of the allegations and claims of the appellant concerning the nature of narcotics addiction rather than observations of the court. The general comments on narcotics addiction drawn from appellant’s brief are simply a summary of the views of some writers on the subject. Neither this court nor any other court has ever held that drug addiction is per se a form of mental disease or “insanity” in the context of assessing criminal responsibility.
Robinson v. California, 370 U.S. 660, 82 S.Ct. 1417, 8 L.Ed.2d 758 (1962), had nothing to do with the problems of criminal responsibility, which is the only issue presented by the case now before us. In Robinson the Supreme Court held nothing more than that a state cannot make narcotics addiction a crime any more than it could declare “having a common cold” to be a crime; this obviously correct conclusion is the sum total of its holding.
The majority opinion in the present case contains the following statement as a quotation from Robinson (as quoted in our own case, Brown v. United States, 118 U.S.App.D.C. 76, 77, 331 F.2d 822, 823 (1964)):
“ * * * ‘[Njarcotie addiction is an illness. * * * “Of course it is generally conceded that a narcotic addict, particularly one addicted to the use of heroin, is in a state of *496mental and physical illness.” ’ Robinson v. California, 370 U.S. 660, 667 and n. 8, 82 S.Ct. 1417,1420, 8 L.Ed. 2d 758 (1962).”
To the extent this gives the impression that Robinson either held or said that addiction is a mental disease, it is misleading. The first five words are indeed an accurate quotation from the body of the Robinson opinion,1 while the quoted sentence following those words does not actually appear in the text of Robinson and most certainly does not represent a holding of the Robinson case or even a statement of the Supreme Court’s views. Examination of the Robinson opinion at page 667, 82 S.Ct. at page 1420 shows that the source of the latter part of the above quote is note 8 in which the Court alludes to a statement in the brief of the appellee:
“In its brief the appellee stated: ‘Of course it is generally conceded that a narcotic addict, particularly one addicted to the use of heroin, is in a state of mental and physical illness. So is an alcoholic.’ ”
By quoting this statement the Supreme Court in no sense held or implied that either drug addiction or alcohol addiction is to be equated with “insanity.” By the same token, I assume that the majority opinion here does not adopt any or all of Castle’s contentions by reciting them. It should therefore be clear that neither this court nor the Supreme Court has held in any sense that addiction is a “mental disease” or “insanity” in the context of determining criminal responsibility.
Whether a given condition is a mental disease is an issue of fact dependent upon evidence and when there is evidence warranting submission to the jury it is for the jury to decide whether that evidence adds up to “mental disease.” In McDonald we sought to establish a yardstick which would reduce the significance of medical labels by defining mental illness, for the purposes of the criminal law, as being an abnormal condition of the mind which substantially affects mental or emotional processes and substantially impairs capacity to control behavior.
Note 1 of the majority opinion also states: “The defense of insanity based on drug addiction generally presents a jury issue as to criminal responsibility. Horton v. United States, 115 U.S.App. D.C. 184, 317 F.2d 595 (1963); Rivers v. United States [117 U.S.App.D.C. 375], 330 F.2d 841 (No. 17,950, decided March 5, 1964).”
However, an examination of the Horton and Rivers cases reveals that neither of them stands for a proposition as broad as is set forth in note 1. In both Horton and Rivers there was expert medical testimony that appellants had a “mental disease”; for that reason, and not because of narcotics addiction, these cases presented a criminal responsibility issue for the jury. In neither Horton nor Rivers was this court faced with deciding whether narcotics addiction, standing alone and without testimony of mental disease, was evidence of “insanity.” To the extent that the majority opinion gives intimations that narcotics addiction per se raises the issue of criminal responsibility, it is not an accurate reflection of our holdings; if that were so, virtually every narcotics case in the courts would have the issue. I assume we can take judicial notice, from hundreds of cases in this court, that the street “peddlers” and “pushers” of narcotics are almost invariably themselves narcotics addicts who are exploited by those who control the narcotics rackets. It is not too difficult to contemplate how much more effectively these unfortunates could be exploited if this court were to equate addiction per se with “insanity,” thus opening the door to evading the severe penalties Congress has fixed for trafficking in narcotics. Certainly some addicts are mentally ill persons and some mentally ill persons are addicts, and in *497some cases it is difficult for the experts to determine whether mental disorder led to addiction or the addiction brought on mental disorder; when both are present the basic difficulty of isolating what we call diseases of the mind from those of the body are compounded. But it is not correct to suggest that all addicts are “insane” any more than to suggest that all criminals are “insane.”
The core of the problem since our McDonald holding is not one of labels whether “disease” or “addiction” but whether an abnormal condition of the mind has substantially impaired the accused’s capacity to control his behavior.

. These five words add up to a statement of the long-accepted medical view that narcotics addiction is a physiological disease.