THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. BETTY HORN, Defendant and Appellant.
Crim. No. 12926
Third Dist.
Aug. 1, 1984
158 Cal. App. 3d 1014
W. Ray Jones, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, and Jones & Stephens for Defendant and Appellant.
Quin Denvir, State Public Defender, Charles M. Sevilla, Deputy State Public Defender, Linda E. Shostak, Christina Hall, Roy M. Bartlett and Morrison & Foerster as Amici Curiae on behalf of Defendant and Appellant.
John K. Van de Kamp, Attorney General, Joel Carey, Nancy Sweet and Garrett Beaumont, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
Christopher N. Heard as Amicus Curiae for Plaintiff and Respondent.
OPINION
SPARKS, J.- “It is fundamental to our system of jurisprudence that a person cannot be convicted for acts performed while insane.” (People v. Kelly (1973) 10 Cal.3d 565, 574 [111 Cal.Rptr. 171, 516 P.2d 875].) But who is insane? In this case we explore that question by considering the type of showing which will support a finding of not guilty by reason of insanity under
Defendant Betty Horn stands convicted of vehicular manslaughter. (
FACTS
The factual circumstances are not in dispute. On the afternoon of September 17, 1982, defendant drove her automobile into the self-service island of
Defendant told the gas station attendant that someone was bringing money to her and the attendant suggested defendant move her car so she would not block the island. Defendant got into her car and drove out of the station. As she did so she almost struck another car. She then drove through a parking lot, across a cement border into a field, into another parking lot, and finally onto the road. An attendant from the gas station followed defendant on his motorcycle. He observed defendant travel at 80 to 85 miles per hour, and run a red light. Defendant continued at 80 to 85 miles per hour until she approached another red light. At that time she applied her brakes and slowed to about 60 miles per hour, and then entered the intersеction. There defendant collided with another motorcycle and tragically killed the rider.
Defendant was charged with vehicular manslaughter. (
During the sanity trial it was established beyond any doubt that defendant suffers from mental illness. Her family has a history of mental disease and she has been under treatment for mental illness for a number of years. Dr. Alfred French, a court-appointed psychiatrist, diagnosed defendant‘s illness as a manic-depressive disorder. The other court-appointed psychiatrist, Dr. Audrey Mertz, concurred and added that defendant‘s illness is a bipolar affective disorder. This means that she is subject to mood swings and may suffer from both the manic and depressive aspects of the disease at different times.
Defendant has been hospitalized from time to time for her illness, including a hospitalization as recent as July 1982. During her treatment for the disease defendant has been given lithium, which is one of the primary means of treating her illness. When she was discharged from the hospital in July 1982, her lithium treatment was discontinued.
Dr. Mertz agreed that in the manic phase of her illness defendant would have difficulty determining right from wrong and in understanding the nature and quality of her acts. Her judgment, in Mertz’ opinion, was seriously impaired so that she could not act in a responsible way.
Defendant testified at the insanity phase of the trial. It appeared that in the months befоre the accident her life had been in turmoil. Her husband had taken the children and filed for a dissolution. She had begun seeing Donald Parcher, who was a fellow mental patient, and he had mistreated her. She had been using her husband‘s credit card for living expenses, but had been required to return it. She had then begun selling her furniture to obtain funds. Shortly before this incident there had been a fire in defendant‘s residence.1
The night before the accident defendant had driven to Fresno. She spent the night with her sister and brother-in-law, and then left to return to Sacramento. On the way she was involved in a minor traffic accident. When she arrived in Sacramento she was out of gas and went to the Texaco station. Although she knew she had no money, she wanted her husband to come to the station and pay for her gas. When she called him, however, he either could not or would not come to the station. She then got into her car and headed towards a friend‘s house to obtain money. She observed the attendant from the station following on his motorcycle and was afraid of him, although she was nоt trying to get away from him. She remembered seeing the red light before the collision, but could not remember if she tried to stop. She did not see the motorcyclist before the collision.
Based upon this evidence, the trial court found that defendant was sane at the time of the accident. The court so found based upon its view that Proposition 8 added a more strict standard than any of the usual tests for insanity. The court expressly indicated that defendant “was legally insane
DISCUSSION
This case squarely presents issues of the meaning and validity of
“The starting point from an historical point of view is the ancient position which did not regard mental disorder, or insanity, as having any bearing upon the matter of criminal guilt.” (Perkins on Criminal Law (2d ed. 1969) p. 850.) Eventually it became common, and finally a matter of course, for the king to grant a pardon to a person who committed a crime while insane. (Id., at pp. 850-851.) During the time of Edward III (1327-1377), absolute madness became a defense to a criminal charge. (Ibid.) So long as insanity was not a defense and only enabled the accused to obtain a pardon, the law did not attempt to define insanity since it depended upon the king‘s grace. (Ibid.) When insanity became a defense to a charge of crime, it was generally held that the insanity must be total: the accusеd had to be wholly without the capacity to understand and remember in order to be innocent by reason of insanity. (Perkins on Criminal Law, supra, at pp. 851-852.)3
The M‘Naghten “right and wrong” standard was early adopted in California as the standard for an insanity defense. In People v. Coffman (1864) 24 Cal. 230, at page 235, the Supreme Court quoted the answer of the judges to the House of Lords as the proper test of insanity. (See Platt & Diamond, The Origins of the “Right and Wrong” Test of Criminal Responsibility and its Subsequent Development in the United States: A Historical Survey (1966) 54 Cal.L.Rev. 1227, 1257.) Numerous appellate decisions can be found citing this test as the correct standard for criminal insanity, but it should be understood that the courts were never misled about what was really at issue. For example, in People v. M‘Donell (1873) 47 Cal. 134, at pages 135 and 136, the court indicated that “[t]he true test of insanity is whether the accused, at the time of committing the crime, was conscious that he was doing what he ought not to do.” Similarly, in People v. Hoin (1882) 62 Cal. 120, at pages 120 and 121, the court noted the inquiry is directed at the accused‘s knowledge of right and wrong in respect to the very act with which he is charged. Yet again in People v. Willard
The insanity test based upon the M‘Naghten case has generally become known as the “right and wrong” test. As Perkins explained, “[i]n the old days of the so-called ‘wild beast test,’ when criminal incapacity because of mental disorder required a total deprivation of mind and memory, the explanation was that such a person could not commit a crime because if he ‘could not distinguish between good and evil, and did not know what he did’ there was no ‘wicked will and intention’ (no mens rea).” (Perkins on Criminal Law, op. cit. supra, p. 860, fn. omitted.)6 From this crude test, M‘Naghten evolved: “And since this was the reason why such a person was incapable of committing crime it was only logical to take the position that one also lacked criminal capacity if he did not know what he was doing, or was unable to distinguish between right and wrong in regard thereto, even if his mental derangement fell a little short of a total deprivation of mind and mеmory.” (Perkins on Criminal Law, supra, at p. 860.) Although various phrases have been used to set forth the M‘Naghten test, “[i]n substance these all have reference to whether the defendant really knew what he was doing, and this is true whether we have in mind an extreme situation such as Stephen‘s illustration of a man who thought his homicidal act was ‘breaking a jar,’ [Stephen, Digest of the Criminal Law, art. 6, illustration (1) (8th ed. (1947)] or an inquiry whether there was an understanding of the ‘real nature and true character of the act as a crime, and not . . . the mere act itself.’ [Brown v. Commonwealth, 78 Pa. 122, 128 (1875)].” (Ibid., fns. omitted.)
Although the M‘Naghten right and wrong standard became the test for insanity in the majority of American jurisdictions, numerous criticisms were directed at it. (See People v. Drew, supra, 22 Cal.3d at pp. 341-343; People v. Wolff (1964) 61 Cal.2d 795, 800 [394 P.2d 959].) Some jurisdictions have modified or abandoned the M‘Naghten test in favor of tests providing
Another test developed was the Durham [Durham v. United States (D.C. Cir. 1954) 214 F.2d 862 (45 A.L.R.2d 1430)], or “product” test. That test required the trier of fact to determine whether the accused was insane, and if so, whether the wrongful act was the product of his insanity. (See Perkins, op. cit. supra, p. 875.) The Durham formulation received little support from lawmakers and courts (ibid.), but a number of jurisdictions added the irresistible impulse test to the right and wrong test as the measure of criminal insanity. In Leland v. Oregon (1951) 343 U.S. 790 [96 L.Ed. 1302, 72 S.Ct. 1002], the United States Supreme Court addressed the insanity issue. In that case it was contended that the Oregon scheme, which adhered to the right and wrong test and also required the accused to prove his insanity beyоnd a reasonable doubt, was unconstitutional. The court rejected the arguments on both counts. As to the right and wrong test the court said: “Knowledge of right and wrong is the exclusive test of criminal responsibility in a majority of American jurisdictions. The science of psychiatry has made tremendous strides since that test was laid down in M‘Naghten‘s Case, but the progress of science has not reached a point where its learning would compel us to require the states to eliminate the right and wrong test from their criminal law. Moreover, choice of a test of legal sanity involves not only scientific knowledge but questions of basic policy as to the extent to which that knowledge should determine criminal responsibility. This whole problem has evoked wide disagreement among those who have studied it. In these circumstances it is clear that adoption of the irresistible impulse test is not ‘implicit in the concept of ordered liberty.‘” (343 U.S. at pp. 800-801 [96 L.Ed. at p. 1310.)
From an early date the California Supreme Court was urged to adopt the irresistible impulse test as a means of determining criminal responsibility, but thе court refused to do so. In People v. Hoin, supra, 62 Cal. at page
In the latter part of this century the court continued to adhere to its acceptance of the right and wrong test as the sole California formulation of the insanity defense. Further, the court began to see the M‘Naghten test as an integral part of our legislative scheme for the appraisal of criminal responsibility. (See People v. Nash (1959) 52 Cal.2d 36, 43-48 [338 P.2d 416].) Thus the court continually advised that arguments for a change of the insanity standard must be addressed to the Legislature rather than the courts. (See People v. Rittger (1960) 54 Cal.2d 720, 732 [7 Cal.Rptr. 901, 355 P.2d 645]; People v. Nash, supra, 52 Cal.2d at p. 48; People v. Berry (1955) 44 Cal.2d 426, 433 [282 P.2d 861], overruled on another ground in People v. St. Martin (1970) 1 Cal.3d 524, 537 [83 Cal. Rptr. 166, 463 P.2d 390].) Despite such statemеnts by the courts, the Legislature refused to act although on at least two occasions the issue was before it. At the time the decision in People v. Wolff, supra, 61 Cal.2d 795, was issued the Legislature had before it a bill which would have added an element of volition to the insanity test. (61 Cal.2d at p. 803, fn. 5.) And at the time of the decision in People v. Kelly, supra, 10 Cal.3d 565, the Legislature was considering revision of the Penal Code in a manner which would not have spoken in terms of the M‘Naghten formulation. (See the conc. opn. of Mosk, J. at 10 Cal.3d at p. 580.) Nevertheless, no legislative change was made in the test of insanity as a defense to crime.
Although refusing to abandon the right and wrong test as the measure of criminal responsibility, the “California courts have not been unresponsive to such proposals for liberalization of the original language of the M‘Naughten rule . . .; in evolving our own rule to meet statutory requirements, apply humane concepts, and at the same time protect society, we have reformulated the test with a variety of specifications to achieve this end.” (People v. Wolff, supra, 61 Cal.2d at p. 800.) Thus, the courts have declined to construe knowledge of the nature and wrongfulness of an act аs the mere ability to verbalize the “right” or socially expected answers when questioned. In order to be considered sane and therefore responsible for his actions, a defendant had to have the kind of knowledge that is relevant, namely an understanding or appreciation of the wrongfulness of his conduct.
At this point it is appropriate to note an anomaly in some of our decisional law. The cases have consistently placed emphasis, indeed the total emphasis, upon the cognitive ability of the defendant. (See People v. Drew, supra, 22 Cal.3d at p. 341.) The question was repeatedly phrased in terms of the defendant‘s ability to understand the wrongfulness of his conduct. (See People v. Wolff, supra, 61 Cal.2d at pp. 800-801 and cases cited therein.) Such ability was determined by reference to the M‘Naghten formula: whether he could know the nature and quality of his act or, if he did know it, whether he could know that what he was doing was wrong. As Perkins points out, “a man who does not know what he is doing is in no position to distinguish between right and wrong in reference to the happening which he does not understand, although he might know what he is doing without being able to distinguish between right and wrong as to such an act. Hence the statement of criminal incapacity on this basis properly uses the word ‘or’ to connect these two, and it has been held reversible error to substitute ‘and‘.” (Perkins, op. cit. supra, at pp. 861-862, fns. omitted.)
While California appellate decisions have always stated the test in terms of whether the accused could know the wrongfulness of his conduct, the courts have nevertheless from time to time been lax in their statement of the M‘Naghten standard. It is thus not uncommon to find decisions anomalously approving language which states the M‘Naghten test in terms of a lack of understanding of the nature and quality of the act and the inability to perceive the aсt to be wrongful. (See for example, People v. Nash, supra, 52 Cal.2d at pp. 42-43, fn. 3; People v. French (1939) 12 Cal.2d 720, 730 [87 Cal.Rptr. 1014], overruled on another ground in People v. Valentine
In People v. Drew, supra, 22 Cal.3d 333, the Supreme Court reversed itself and judicially abandoned M‘Naghten. In its stead the court decreed that trial courts should apply the test developed by the American Law Institute for its Model Penal Code, known as the ALI test. (22 Cal.3d at p. 345.) Under that test, “[a] person is not responsible for criminal conduct if at the time of such conduct as a result of mental disease or defect he lacks substantial capacity either to appreciate the criminality [wrongfulness] of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirements of law.” (Model Penal Code (Official Draft 1962) § 4.01.) This test alters the test for insanity in at least two major respects. First, it does away with the all-or-nothing language of M‘Naghten,9 and replaces it with a less stringent standard of substantial capacity. (22 Cal.3d at p. 346.) Second, it adds a volitional prong to the test by requiring the capacity to cоnform to legal requirements. (Ibid.) The court was not inaccurate when it described the ALI test as “a broad test of nonresponsibility.” (Ibid.)
The ALI test was itself rejected four years later when the people exercised the legislative power through the retained right of initiative by enacting Proposition 8 at the June 1982 Primary Election. Among other things that measure enacted
The liberalization of the M‘Naghten rule, which we have already described, reached its zenith in Wolff. There the court approved this “commendably broad interpretation upon the M‘Naghten ‘knowledge’ test: . . . ‘The test of sanity is this: First, did the defendant have sufficient mental capacity to know and understand what he was doing, and second, did he know and understand that it was wrong and a violation of the rights of another?‘” (People v. Wolff, supra, 61 Cal.2d at p. 801; italics in original.) As can be seen, this test of sanity uses the conjunctive “and” construction. Conversely, the test of insanity necessarily must use the disjunctive “or” form. In order to be sane, “‘the defendant must be able to know and understand the nature and quality of his act and to distinguish between right and wrong at the time of the commission of the offense.‘” (Ibid., italics in original.) Thus if a defendant knows and understands the nature and quality of his act but does not know it is wrong, he is, by definition, insane. Hence the reciprocal tests of sanity and insanity were correctly stated in CALJIC No. 4.00 (3d ed. 1970): “If you find that the defendant was capable of knowing and understanding the nature and quality of his act and, in addition, was capable of knowing and understanding that his act was wrong, you will find that he was legally sane. However, if you find that the defendant was not capable of knowing or understanding the nature and quality of his act, you will find that he was legally insane; or, if you find that he was incapable of knowing or understanding that his act was wrong, you will find that he was legally insane.” The confusion over the correct usage of the conjunctive/disjunctive form of the M‘Naghten rule thus arises from the failure to distinguish between the alternative definitions of sanity and insanity. This not uncommon confusion is evident in the Proposition 8 formulation of the M‘Naghten test. We accept this blurred statement for what it appears to be, a careless draft, rather than divining in it some inexplicable regression by California‘s citizens to medieval barbarism.
We do not lightly disregard the fact that the word “and” is used in the statute. Nevertheless, “the word ‘or’ is often used as a careless substitute for the word ‘and‘; that is, it is often used in phrases where ‘and’ would express the thought with greater clarity.” (De Sylva v. Ballentine (1955) 351 U.S. 570, 573 [100 L.Ed. 1415, 1424, 76 S.Ct. 974].) That the converse is also true is demonstrated in the number of appellate decisions phras-
Where, as here, we are concerned with a measure adopted by the people through the initiative power, it is appropriate that the purpose of the measure be determined by reference to the language used, the ballot summary, the argument and analysis presented to the voters, and the contemporaneous construction by the Legislature. (See Los Angeles County Transportation Com. v. Richmond (1982) 31 Cal.3d 197, 203 [182 Cal. Rptr. 324, 643 P.2d 941]; Amador Valley Joint Union High Sch. Dist. v. State Bd. of Equalization (1978) 22 Cal.3d 208, 245-246 [149 Cal.Rptr. 239, 583 P.2d 1281].)
The purpose of Proposition 8 is stated in section 3 of the initiative measure. That section added
Proposition 8 was therefore intended to serve as a deterrent to criminal bеhavior. Deterrence was the precise reason our courts refused to adopt the irresistible impulse theory before Drew. As we have recounted, as long ago as 1882, the Supreme Court noted the three powerful deterrents to criminal behavior: the restraints of religion, conscience, and law. Of these only the restraint of law—the power to forbid and punish crime—is within the function of the government. To permit a disposition to commit crime to serve as an excuse for criminal behavior would be to remove this powerful deterrent and to withdraw from the state the power to deter crime. (See People
The primary means by which Proposition 8 deters crime is through punishment. “In the perspective of penal law, however, punishment must be interpreted consistently with a view of human nature that takes account of problem-solving and available empirical knowledge as well as of valuation. The key to this interpretation is the meaning of responsibility, which includes normal competence, authorship of a proscribed harm and accountability. In sum, punishment is a corollary of responsibility, based upon the сoncept of man as capable, within limits, of making free choices and putting them into effect.” (Hall, General Principles of Criminal Law (2d ed. 1960) p. 460.) The criminal law has long been based upon the concept of freedom of choice and adherence to the M‘Naghten test has been based upon the refusal of the courts to accept the proposition that a person who knowingly commits a wrongful or criminal act should not be held accountable. (See People v. Gilberg, supra, 197 Cal. at pp. 313-314.) But the M‘Naghten test recognizes that those who are incapable of understanding the wrongfulness of their conduct have no opportunity of choice and cannot harbor an evil intent or mens rea. “In sum, what the [right from wrong] clause requires is incapacity, due to serious mental disease, to make the relevant valuations of a normal adult—to realize, for instance, that it is wrong to kill a human being or take his property. . . . It expresses in plain words an abiding insight into what is paramount in human nature.” (Hall, General Principles of Criminal Law, supra, pp. 481-482.)
. . .
It can thus be seen that the purposеs of Proposition 8 would be served by the abrogation of Drew, but not by the abrogation of M‘Naghten. As we have noted, the language of the initiative adopts and utilizes the language
While the ballot pamphlet makes clear that Proposition 8 was intended, in part, to provide a more stringent standard for insanity than the “broad test of nonresponsibility” adopted in Drew, it does not provide guidance in determining what the new test was to be. Perhaps in this respect the ballot pamphlet is more significant in what it does not contain than in what it is in it. As our discussion has demonstrated, the M‘Naghten test has generally focused upon the defendant‘s ability to understand what he was doing was wrong. This test is satisfied if the defendant either lacked the capacity to understand the nature and quality of his actions, in which case he could not be able to understand right and wrong in relation therеto, or was incapable of knowing that what he was doing was wrong. If Proposition 8 in fact requires the defendant to establish both of these M‘Naghten prongs, then despite its similarity to the language of M‘Naghten, it has abolished M‘Naghten‘s right and wrong standard. In fact, it would adopt for California the most stringent and difficult test for criminal insanity employed by a common law jurisdiction since the days of the old English common law. (See People v. Drew, supra, 22 Cal.3d at pp. 342-346; Leland v. Oregon, supra, 343 U.S. 800-801 [96 L.Ed. at 1309-1310].) If such were the pur-
Proposition 8 was passed by the electorate on June 8, 1982, and became law the following day. (People v. Smith (1983) 34 Cal.3d 251, 258 [186 Cal.Rptr. 77, 651 P.2d 321].) On that day the Attorney General issued his Attorney General‘s Guide to Proposition 8, Victims’ Bill of Rights. The accompanying cover letter, addressed to district attorneys, sheriffs, and chief probation officers, recites: “I have assembled a team of people in the Depаrtment of Justice. That team has prepared the material in this guide to help you in its implementation and to aid in its defense against the inevitable attacks.” With regard to
Finally, in determining the intent of a statutory enactment it is important to consider the state of the law as it existed prior to the enactment of the provision at issue. (Estate of Simoni (1963) 220 Cal.App.2d 339, 341 [33 Cal.Rptr. 845].) The body of literature on the insanity defense is enormous, and usually centers around the appropriateness of the M‘Naghten test. (See People v. Drew, supra, 22 Cal.3d at pp. 340-344.) Criticisms of the test address numerous issues, but generally assert that the test is too “strict” to serve its purpose. (Ibid., see also Diamond, From M‘Naghten to Currens, and Beyond, (1962) 50 Cal. L.Rev. 189.) But significantly absent from the literature is the suggestion that M‘Naghten is too “lenient” as a test of insanity. Indeed, the California doctrine of diminished capacity was expressly fashioned to ameliorate the harshness of the M‘Naghten rule. (People v. Henderson (1963) 60 Cal.2d 482, 490 [35 Cal.Rptr. 77, 386 P.2d 677].)11 In California, until the decision in Drew, the M‘Naghten standard, despite its liberalization, was rigidly adhered to by the courts as the exclusive test for insanity. The Legislature similarly declined to abandon M‘Naghten, and on the occasions legislation was introduced to do so it
For all of these reasons, we decline to interpret thе statute as enacting a new drooling idiot test in place of the century old M‘Naghten standard merely because it uses the single, and often misused, conjunctive “and.” That conjunctive is too thin a reed to support such a massive doctrinal transformation.
In this case in addition to the briefs from defendant and the People we have accepted amicus curiae briefs from the State Public Defender and the California Attorneys for Criminal Justice in support of defendant, and from the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation in support of the People. It is significant that all of the parties who have submitted briefs are in agreement that the insanity provisions of Proposition 8 were intended to abrogate Drew and return to the traditional M‘Naghten standard. While we are reluctant to decide a matter of statewide significance based upon a concession of the parties, in this case our independent research convinces us that this position is sound. Accordingly, we hold that
Since we conclude that Proposition 8 and
(6a) Defendant contends the People are collaterally estopped to deny that she was insane. This is based on the fact, pointed out to the trial court, that in a Placer County proceeding on an arson charge which occurred shortly before the present incident, defendant was found to have been legally insane. We reject the contention that collateral estoppel is applicable here. “Collateral estoppel precludes a party to an action from relitigating in a second proceeding matters litigated and determined in a prior proceeding.” (People v. Sims (1982) 32 Cal.3d 468, 477 [186 Cal.Rptr. 77, 651 P.2d 321], citations and fn. omitted.) Consequently, “an adjudication of an issue in a criminal trial may collaterally estop the state from pursuing another criminal prosecution based on the same controversy.” (32 Cal.3d at p. 482.) But that doctrine applies only where the issue sought to be relitigated is identical to an issue already necessarily decided in prior litigation. (People v. Taylor (1974) 12 Cal.3d 686, 691 [117 Cal.Rptr. 70, 527 P.2d 622]; Jackson v. City of Sacramento (1981) 117 Cal.App.3d 596, 602 [172 Cal.Rptr. 826].) The issue in an insanity trial is whether the defendant, at the time of the commission of the offense, could appreciate right and wrong in relation to the very act with which she is charged. (People v. Wolff, supra, 61 Cal.2d at pp. 800-801.) Whether defendant could appreciate the wrongfulness of her conduct in relationship to an arson some days before this incident is not determinative of her sanity in this case and hence poses a different issue in a different controversy. As the psychiatric testimony in this case established, defendant‘s illness subjects her to mood swings and her mental capacity at one point in time is not necessarily indicative оf her capacity at another time. In short, the sanity issue decided in the Placer County prosecution is not identical to the issue posed in this case because proof of insanity on one day is not proof of insanity on another. (People v. Glover (1967) 257 Cal.App.2d 502, 509 [65 Cal.Rptr. 219].)
The People, while agreeing that
The trial court rejected the insanity defense, but in doing so it expressly found that defendant met the second prong of the M‘Naghten test because she was incapable of distinguishing between right and wrong at the time of the incident. Since this finding established insanity under the M‘Naghten test, defendant is entitled to a judgment of not guilty by reason of insanity. (See People v. Kelly, supra, 10 Cal.3d at p. 577.)
The judgment is reversed and the cause is remanded to the trial court with directions to enter a judgment of not guilty by reason of insanity and to take such further proceedings as are required by law.
Sims, J., concurred.
EVANS, Acting P. J.—I respectfully dissent.
Although the conclusion reached by the majority that the voters, by enacting Proposition 8 which added
The M‘Naghten standard, traditionally referred to as the “right and wrong” test, was judicially stated to be “[T]o establish a defense on the ground of insanity, it must be clearly proved that, at the time of the committing of the act, the party accused was labouring 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.” (M‘Naghten‘s Case (1843) 10 Clark & Fin. 200, 210 [8 Eng. Rep. 718, 722].) (Italics added.) I emphasize the use of the disjunctive to demonstrate what I perceive as the flaw in the judicial reasoning utilized by the majority in reaching their conclusion that the voters intended to merely reestablish the original M‘Naghten standard for proving criminal insanity.
The text of
The terms “and” and “or,” clearly conjunctive and disjunctive, may have at times in the past been erroneously used interchangeably by careless courts; however, that circumstance does not permit us to be so presumptive as to conclude the people, by their initiative process, didn‘t mean what they clearly stated, that the conjunctive rather than the disjunctive be required and both prongs of the M‘Naghten test be established in order to prove insanity as a criminal defense.
Even though the conclusion I reach may be simplistic when measured in the light of the dissertation presented by the majority on the historical development and effects of the various definitions of insanity used by the courts, I am forced to that conclusion by the compulsion of mandated judicial restraint when attempting to ascertain the intent of the voters in enacting, by the initiative method, this statute.
The proper point of beginning for a review of such a statute is by an attempt to ascertain the intent of the voters. In this instance, prior to the initiative election, Proposition 8 received widespread publicity. Newspaper, radio, and television editorials focused on its provisions and extensive public debate involving the proposition described the pros and the cons of the measure. Moreover, before the election, each voter received an election pamphlet containing the title and summary prepared by the Attorney General, a detailed analysis of the measure prepared by the legislative analyst, and a complete text of the proposed law. That text contains the entirety of the 10 sections of the Victims’ Bill of Rights and included in strikeout type the text of
The defendant implicates the argument that the voters were misled or confused in requiring the more difficult standard of proving both prongs of the M‘Naghten test. Such an argument can only be based upon the improbable assumption that the people did not know what they were doing. In our judicial review, we should not lightly presume that the voters were unaware of the consequences of their actions in approving Proposition 8. Rather, in accord with the Supreme Court‘s mandated procedures, “we ordinarily should assume that the voters who approved a constitutional amendment ‘. . . have voted intelligently upon an amendment to their organic law, the whole text of which was supplied to each of them prior to the election and which they must be assumed to have duly considered . . . .’ [Citation.]” (Amador Valley Joint Union High Sch. Dist. v. State Bd. of Equalization (1978) 22 Cal.3d 208, 243-244 [149 Cal.Rptr. 239, 583 P.2d 1281].)
All insanity tests recognize distinctions among the mentally ill and exculpate only those whose illness results in an incapacity to meet the then minimum criterion for responsibility. Under any analysis, “sound mind” and “legal sanity” are not synonymous. The purpose of rules regarding insanity as a defense have traditionally been to separate the sane from the insane so far as criminal culpability is concerned. The mere fact that
. . .
The section under challenge provides in pertinent part, “In any criminal proceeding, . . . in which a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity is entered, this defense shall be found by the trier of fact only when the accused person proves by a preponderance of the evidence that he or she was incapable of knowing or understanding the nature and quality of his or her act and of distinguishing right from wrong at the time of the commission of the offense.” (Italics added.) I would conclude the trial court properly ruled the statute required defendant to prove both prongs of the insanity test by a preponderance of the evidence.
I can find nothing in the statute, the entire initiative, the arguments presented in favor of, in rebuttal to, or in explanation of the text of the initiative, that would imply that the voters did not intend the conjunctive to be
Since the defendant failed to establish by a preponderance of the evidence that she met both standards enunciated in the statute, I would affirm the judgment.
A petition for a rehearing was denied August 27, 1984, and respondent‘s petition for a hearing by the Supreme Court was denied October 4, 1984. Lucas, J., was of the opinion that the petition should be granted.