NCJ Number
91544
Journal
Yale Law Journal Volume: 92 Issue: 3 Dated: (January 1983) Pages: 475-498
Date Published
1983
Length
24 pages
Annotation
The additional burdens on the person convicted under a guilty but mentally ill (GBMI) law are constitutionally impermissible under the due process clauses of the 5th and 14th amendments.
Abstract
The GBMI verdict authorizes both a conventional criminal sanction and psychiatric treatment for a mentally ill defendant who sought to be found not guilty by reason of insanity. This new verdict ostensibly permits society to offer compassion and rehabilitation to the offender, while condemning the crime and providing for State control over the offender for the period of the criminal sentence. GBMI laws, however, lack protections normally associated with the exercise of State power of the type that the GBMI verdict authorizes. The note argues that this verdict implicates several interests rooted in the 1st, 4th, 5th, 8th, and 14th amendments, as well as in penumbral privacy rights. The note identifies differential losses experienced by the GBMI inmate relative to persons convicted under the traditional guilty verdict and proposes a less restrictive alternative that minimizes such losses while protecting State interests. This less restrictive alternative would be based on a finding of current need and include an offer of voluntary treatment to any inmate who made an insanity defense. This would reduce the chance of error, reduce losses to the individual, and protect the interests of the State as well or better than the GBMI system. A total of 125 case notes are included.