Psychiatry and Psychology

Insanity Defense

A legal concept that an accused is not criminally responsible if, at the time of committing the act, the person was laboring under such a defect of reason from disease of the mind as not to know the nature and quality of the act done or if the act was known, to not have known that what was done was wrong. (From Black's Law Dictionary, 6th ed)

National Library of MedicineMedical Subject Headings2026

Structured Summary

Abstract

A legal concept that an accused is not criminally responsible if, at the time of committing the act, the person was laboring under such a defect of reason from disease of the mind as not to know the nature and quality of the act done or if the act was known, to not have known that what was done was wrong. (From Black's Law Dictionary, 6th ed)

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Synonyms

7 entry terms
  • Defense, Insanity
  • Criminal Insanity
  • M'Naghten Rule
  • McNaughton Rule
  • Insanity, Criminal
  • Rule, M'Naghten
  • Rule, McNaughton

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Aspects Covered

3 allowable subheadings

Indexed with the subheadings classification, history, statistics & numerical data.

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History Note

91(85); was see under FORENSIC PSYCHIATRY 1985-90; was MCNAUGHTON RULE see under FORENSIC PSYCHIATRY 1969-84; was MCNAUGHTON RULE see under JURISPRUDENCE, PSYCHIATRIC 1968

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NLM Classification

W 740

AMA Style

References

  1. National Library of Medicine. Insanity Defense. Medical Subject Headings (MeSH). 2026. Unique ID D007298. http://id.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/2026/D007298
  2. Insanity Defense. In: Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insanity_defense
  3. Insanity Defense. In: Wikidata. https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q705920