Massachusetts: The defendant hacked his sleeping victim to death with a sword, motivated by jealousy over the victim's having become romantically involved with his former girlfriend. Though he argued that he lacked criminal responsibility for his conduct, a jury convicted him of first degree murder. On appeal, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts held that the trial judge, in instructing the jury, did not err when she failed to define "mental disease or defect" in response to a question from the jury, and did not err when she stated that "a great majority of the people are sane," with the resulting probability "that any particular person, including the defendant, is sane." Corn. v. Casey, 705 N.E.2d 1108.

Wisconsin: The defendant was charged with sexual assault of a minor, in that, when he was 18 years old, he had consensual sexual intercourse with a 14-year-old female. Since the victim was in counseling, the defendant moved to see her mental health records; the State did not oppose an in-camera inspection, and the circuit court accepted its waiver of a materiality hearing. On an appeal brought by the guardian ad litem for the victim, the Court of Appeals of Wisconsin held that since neither the victim nor her parents had specifically consented to the disclosure of her records, the State cannot waive the materiality hearing. But the Court also held that the defendant had not made the required showing of materiality-which meant showing more than a mere possibility that the victim's records may be helpful-so that the circuit court was not required to hold an evidentiary hearing before denying the motion. In Re Jessica J.L., 589 N.W.2d 660.

Texas: In a capital murder case, the Court of Appeals of Texas held that the trial court abused its discretion in denying the defendant's request to present an expert witness on the issue of photo bias and eyewitness misidentification. The Court said that in this case, where the issue of the perpetrator's identification was seriously contested by both parties, where the proposed witness was the long-term chairman of a university psychology department, and where the experiments he described relied upon widely accepted principles of the behavioral sciences, the evidence he would present was sufficiently reliable and relevant. Its probative value was not outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, jury confusion or undue delay. Weatherred v. State, 985 S.W.2d 234.

The 15-year-old defendant was initially charged as a juvenile stemming from an incident in which he fired a handgun at two persons, seriously injuring one of them. After a psychological examination, he was transferred to criminal court for prosecution as an adult, and a jury convicted him of attempted capital murder. The Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas held that the juvenile's Sixth Amendment right to counsel was not violated when the state failed to inform his court-appointed counsel relating to the examination on transfer to adult court until after it had taken place. Hidalgo v. State, 983 S.W.2d 746.

Illinois: After a 27-year-old woman committed suicide by taking an overdose of Doxepin, an antidepressant, her estate sued, for wrongful death, the family practice physician who had been treating her. He had diagnosed her as suffering from a general anxiety disorder; a psychiatrist had later diagnosed her as suffering from recurrent major depression, and was the one who initially prescribed Doxepin. The defendant then wrote the patient a prescription for a large supply of the medication, though he knew she had twice attempted suicide about seven years earlier. The trial court permitted the defendant to raise the decedent's contributory negligence as a defense, and the jury found for the defendant. The Supreme Court of Illinois upheld the trial court's decision, stating that the issue of a mentally disturbed person's contributory negligence is a question of fact, unless the evidence discloses that the person is so devoid of reason that he is incapable of being contributorily negligent. Hobart v. Shin, 705 N.E.2d 907. (See also The Forensic Echo, Vol. II, No. 4, pp.21-22.)

New York: The defendant pleaded guilty to knowingly engaging in unlawful securities trading over a period of more than four years. He then moved for downward departure in sentencing, arguing that he committed the offense while suffering from a significantly reduced mental capacity, attributable to a compulsive gambling disorder. But the United States District Court, S.D. New York, denied the motion. The Court agreed that compulsive gambling is a "real and significant psychological disorder' and that the defendant suffered from it. But the Court held that while the defendant's gambling losses may have provided him with an economic incentive to engage in illegal trading, the evidence did not support his claim that the same "psychotic demons that led to his compulsive gambling...found expression in the allure of illegal trading" as a form of gambling which he "could neither resist nor renounce." U.S. v. Carucci, 33 F. Supp. 2d 302.