Show MOVE TO CHECK overplaying OF S INSANITY PLEAS the american people have long been convinced that the insanity plea in criminal courts to Is decidedly overworked it ts Is gratify gratifying in and not ft a little surprising therefore says say the st paul dispatch to learn that the psychiatrists whose science has contributed most to the furthering of nf the insanity plea are now making an aa attempt to close this loophole in the law at a recent annual meeting of the american psychiatric association in new york a committee re report po rt was read advocating radical reforms in legal and penal procedure in capital cases la in which a plea of insanity had been entered by tho the defendant it was recommended that the judge rhall ell eliminate mInate all evidence of tho the mental condition of the defendant except such inch evidence as makes the mental tal disease so BO obvious a lay jury can understand inderst ander stand aad it IL time and again juries have been mystified by the clinical subterfuges and technical ties of insanity pleas in criminal trials on too many occasions the twelve good men and true ha have ve been by psychological fol derol and have permitted justice to be cheated to the ordinary run of citizens citizen who make up jury panels there are mentally only two kinds of people the normal and the crazy the various grades and degrees of mental and nervous disorders which Is the psychiatrists field he comprehends not at all when an insanity plea to Is entered the jury merely wants to know whether the accused Is or Is not responsible for hla his acts keeping such evidence in an understandable form will help the juries and put a limit on the abuse of insanity pleas |