IndexInsanity and automatism in UK jurisdictionCommons between insanity and automatismDiscussionConclusionIn law, there are two main theories that describe and justify punishment: utilitarianism according to which punishment should be inflicted to avoid further damages and the retributivism that intervenes to ensure that there is justice. The defenses ensure that individuals who never freely commit a crime are not punished, particularly in cases where the defendant's actions were influenced by force or were involuntary. All of the above defenses are in one way or another linked to mental disorders. Insanity and automatism play a crucial role in these cases as they present defenses and excuses for the failure of the tests. As such, they are important in court cases where the defendant's mind is confirmed to be abnormal at the time the crime is committed. The nature of the brain disease is irrelevant as long as the mental faculties of understanding, memory and reasoning were impaired at the time of the crime. If the accused was aware of the type of crime committed, insanity can be used as a valid defense. Where cognitive awareness exists, it can function to counteract actus reus and mens rea in the criminal justice system. This article seeks to examine the commonalities of these two defenses which make them inseparable and therefore it is not necessary to have them as separate entities. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Insanity and automatism under UK jurisdiction Insanity shares commonalities and differences with automatism regarding their description, application and their outcomes as defenses. Courts usually use their differences to decide which defendant to release or not to release. This is essential because defenses, if successful, have different outcomes for the suspect. For example, if the automatism defense is successful, the case may be acquitted, insanity, on the other hand, may lead to a special verdict of not guilty. The judges had difficulty trying to make distinctions between the two defenses. Sometimes the defendant may invoke automatism only for judges to replace it with insanity and vice versa (Mackay RD1995). Before the Criminal Procedure Act was enacted in 1991, the obvious outcome for any successful insanity defense was commitment to an indefinite psychiatric hospital. The new law gave judges greater powers to give defendants the choice of a hospital order or supervision order. This to some extent solved the problem of the defendant pleading guilty as a way to avoid the insanity defense being raised. In 1843, the House of Lords introduced M'Naghten's Rules of Insanity Defense which stated: "to establish an insanity defence, it must be clearly shown that, at the time the crime was committed act, the accused party was suffering from such a defect of reason, from disease of mind, that he did not know the nature and quality of the act he was doing or, if he knew it, that he did not know that he was doing what was wrong." . (Glazebrook PR, 2010) Common Elements Between Insanity and Automatism This act further expanded the powers of judges to offer several options after the insanity verdict which include: guardian order, absolute treatment/discharge order and supervision order. Therefore the first element to consider is whether or not the accused knew the nature of the crime committed and whether he was able to control it. The defendant has the burden of proving to the courts thatsuffer from a mental disorder. The test must be passed for the courts to consider the "not guilty by reason of insanity" verdict. This also constitutes the second element of the defendant's defect which impairs his ability to reason. Likewise, the automatism defense considers the defendant's state of mind at the time of the crime. Automatism is defined by Lord Denning as "an act performed by the muscles without any control by the mind such as a spasm, a reflex action or a convulsion, or an act performed by a person who is not conscious of what he is doing as an act done during concussion or sleepwalking" (Mackay RD1995). When the defense is successful, the case is acquitted since no verdict can be issued automatically. Third, the two defenses involve the denial of mens rea (mental state) or actus reus (a prohibited act). Of course, both insanity and automatism are defenses designed to diminish the strength of the judgment expected to be made. Finally, both involve cases in which the defendant suffers from an illness of the mind. A mental defect should be caused by an internal source which may be sleepwalking or epilepsy. The implementation of M'Naghten's rules has been problematic in the modern era due to academic criticism of the traditional narrow definition. More particularly, the application of the “illness of the mind” element proved difficult. This is because it has been considered a mental disorder caused by a certain medical condition. But the courts have a broad interpretation that includes conditions such as epilepsy, occupational sleep and now the inclusion of the most controversial, diabetes, despite it not being recognized as a mental condition by medical professionals. Illness of mind is therefore limited to mental disorder, and is any factor that influences and alters the functioning and reasoning of the mind. The mind, in this case, is the set of mental faculties that help individuals reason, understand and memorize. As described by Lord Diplock, what is important to the courts is the effect of the impairment: "If the effect of a disease is to impair these faculties so severely as to have one of the consequences referred to in the last part of the ruling, it does not matter whether the etiology of the impairment is organic, as in epilepsy, or functional, or whether the impairment itself is permanent or transitory and intermittent, as long as it existed at the time of the commission of the act". and McAuslan, 1984) Diabetic individuals who do not take the prescribed drugs risk suffering from hyperglycemia and therefore insanity. Those who suffer severe reactions from the drug are unable to reason due to external factors, which are the drugs, in this case they fall in automatism.These two conditions make no medical difference with respect to the mental state since both involve the failure of reason. The law, on the other hand, makes no logical distinction between hypoglycemic and hyperglycemic episodes of diabetes and the type of defenses that each should give rise to. This is because instead of making distinctions based on mental or physical conditions, the law directs them to make differences based on whether the individual's lack of reason or control was influenced by internal or external factors. Taking an example of the Quick case (1973), a diabetic patient suffering from a hypoglycemic episode caused physical harm inflicted by the nurse. This is a condition caused by injecting insulin without a proper balanced diet or injecting too much insulin. The court ruled out that this constituted insanity, in response the defendant changed his plea to guilty to avoid hospitalization.