PRINCIPLES LAID DOWN IN McNAGHTEN CASE.

 

PRINCIPLES LAID DOWN IN McNAGHTEN CASE.

In 1843, Mac Naughten killed Mr. Drummond, the private secretary of sir Robert peel, the then prime minister of England. Mc  Naughtan was under the insane delusion that sir peel had injured him and again was going to injure him. So one day mistaking Drummand for sir peel, he shot and killed him. He was tried for murder before chief justice Tindol.

Defence counsel pleaded that due to insanity the accused was not able to know that he was violating laws. Medical report produced in support of proof showed that the accused was laboring under a morbid delusion which carried him away beyond the power of self control.

Judgment: Mc Naughten was acquitted on ground of insanity. This case created a sensation in England and debates were conducted, including in the house of lords. Fifteen law lords formulated some principles which later become famous as “Mc Naughaen principles of insanity’.

Mc Naughten’s principles of insanity

1.  Every man is presumed to be sane, and to possess a sufficient degree of reason to be responsible for his crimes, until the contrary be proved to the satisfaction of jury.

2.  To establish a defence on the ground of insanity, it must be clearly proved that, at the time of committing the act, the accused was laboring under such a defect of reason from disease of the mind, as not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing or if he did know it, that he did not know he was doing what was wrong.

3.  As to his knowledge of the wrongfulness of the act, the judges said, if the accused was conscious that the act was one which he ought not to do and if that act was at the same time contrary to the law of the land, he is punishable.

4.  Where a person, under an insane delusion as to existing facts commits, an offence in consequence thereof criminality must depend on the nature of the delusion. If he labours under partial delusion only, and is not in other respects insane, he must be considered in the same situation as to responsibility as if the facts with respect to which the delusion exists were real.

5.  A medical witness who has not seen the accused before trial should not be asked to give his opinion as to the state of accused mind.