Goldstein R L
College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University, New York, NY.
Bull Am Acad Psychiatry Law. 1989;17(1):61-7.
Although delusions are prima facie evidence of psychosis, their mere presence is not a sufficient condition for exculpation on the grounds of insanity. In most cases, a determination of insanity will depend on the specific content of the delusions and whether, as a result of these delusions, the defendant was unable to know or appreciate the wrongfulness of his or her act. Delusions may be subdivided into four types, according to their content: 1) delusions of being controlled, 2) delusions of grandiosity, 3) delusions of persecution, and 4) delusions of jealousy. An analysis is undertaken of these delusional subtypes in terms of their exculpatory effect within the jurisdictions which follow each of the three respective standards of wrongfulness (i.e., the illegality standard, the subjective moral standard, and the objective moral standard). The criminal law does not recognize a transcendent constancy in the legal insanity status of psychotic individuals whose offense was the result of their delusional ideation. In most such cases, exculpation is based primarily on the specific content of their delusions and how it comports with the law of the jurisdiction specific content of their delusions and how it comports with the law of the jurisdiction in which the act was committed (the lex loci delicti commissi).
