887sMtreme
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- Jan 28, 2013
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Agree. Most states have revised the insanity plea loophole, reserving it for severe mental illness.
Indiana for instance only has "Guilty but mentally ill."
This plea means the prisoner goes to a facility until restored enough to BEGIN their full sentence in regular prison.
This seems an odd application of the insanity plea. To me, if a person committed a crime while legally insane, doesn’t that bring a plea of “NOT GUILTY by reason of insanity?” (Not in Idaho, I know. I’m talking where this defense is acceptable.) When a court validates that plea with a verdict, I don’t know of many mental illnesses serious enough to excuse committing a crime that could be cured so the patient — who may have no memory of wrongdoing — could be sent to prison to pay for that crime. Seems a bit of a tangled web. Can someone knowledgeable explain? I must be missing something.