Who needs capacity?. (May 2015)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Buchanan, Alec
• Is Part Of: International journal of law and psychiatry. Volume 40(2015)
• Page Start: 1
• Page End: 5
• Publication Date: 2015-05
• Subjects: Capacity -- Choice -- Excuse -- Responsibility; Forensic psychiatry -- Periodicals; Insanity (Law) -- Periodicals; Criminal psychology -- Periodicals; Forensic Psychiatry -- Periodicals; Psychiatrie médico-légale -- Périodiques; Aliénation mentale -- Périodiques; Gerechtelijke psychiatrie; Electronic journals; 614.15
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ijlp.2015.04.001
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0160-2527

Abstract

Abstract: The UK Law Commission's Discussion Paper, Criminal Liability: Insanity and Automatism, recommends introducing the concept of capacity to the insanity defence. The concept of capacity has an established role in those parts of the law that concern the validity of the decisions that people make, for instance in composing a will or entering into a contract. Making mental capacity a criterion for criminal responsibility in a mentally disordered defendant, however, is potentially problematic. First, the term capacity already has several different meanings in the literature on the jurisprudence of mental abnormality. Second, using the concept of capacity in the way that the Law Commission proposes poses difficulties that relate to the provision of testimony by expert witnesses.