INSANITY DEFENCE IN CRIMINAL LAW: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS

Abstract

Insanity in a legal context is notoriously difficult to define, involving both medical and other legal considerations (Aftab, 2023).The definition, must be clear and operational, so that courts can tell when a defendant's mental status, at the time of the offense, exempts him from legal responsibility as a criminal. Medical definitions of mental disorder, by contrast, are evolving with progress in psychiatric cognitions and diagnostic standards. Where legal statutes follow behind these scientific strides, discrepancies and complexities exist in the application of the insanity defense. With the emergence of neuroscience within the legal system, a growing body of research have reported on how neuroscience might help explain the function of the brain, and how brain function relates to behavior (Jones and Wagner, 2020; Scarpazza et al., 2021).