The Illustrated Guide to Criminal Law
Chapter 11: Excuse Me!
Excuse pg 19: Diminished Capacity as a Valid Defense
Brian being held down and forced to drink a tall glass of booze like Cary Grant’s character in North by Northwest
Maybe if someone held him down and forced a whole bottle of bourbon down his throat, against his will, but such things don’t happen in real life.
Alfred Hitchcock’s silhouette: “First my Maguffin, now this? Is this homage or theft?”
Average Joe responds: “That’s a different course.”
Similarly, what if Doug had thought that Tina was a dragon, not because of a schizophrenic delusion, but because he was high on hallucinogens?
If he took the drugs on purpose, then that intent is going to be transferred to what he did to Tina. He’s guilty of Murder.
Doug freaking out and seeing dragons, spots, and mushrooms everywhere.
But if his doctor had given them to him by mistake? Then yeah, he might have a valid Diminished Capacity defense.
Who’s the person making the homage or theft comment?
This guy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9DH_uc0dtc
The forced whiskey is from North by Northwest.
There was a murderer in Canada who killed women by forcing bottles of alcohol down their throat. Not usually in such small quantities that they got to use this defense; they discovered him because these women who died of alcohol poisoning had ridiculously high levels of alcohol in their blood, like .900.
I’m pretty sure someone has had a bottle of booze forced down their throat before, like say a Frat party?
Hmm, now that makes for an interesting case,. Fraternity hazing ritual requires pledge to consume a large quantity of alcohol. Pledge is black out drunk as a result. Pledge is dared to steal police car, makes the attempt and in charged with grand theft, drunk driving, public intoxication, and disorderly conduct.
How culpable is the pledge? He could have theoretically refused to participate in the hazing, and becoming intoxicated.
Of course, the frat brothers are also culpable, but if the hazing was administered by several members, are they each individually charged fully for the defendant’s actions?
Who dared the defendant to steal the police car? Perhaps the suggestion was chanted by the whole group? Or suppose it was a fellow pledge who was also black-out drunk at the time he made the suggestion?
Pledge is definitely 100% guilty, and probably no one else. I can’t really see a “dare” to do something illegal rising to the level of solicitation or incitement.
I think you’re missing the point. It’s not the dare that would potentially reduce his culpability, it’s the forced drinking.
‘but such things don’t happen in real life’
I wouldn’t be so sure… :P
Wait, if you get drunk the state holds you responsible for anything you do. Unless it’s sex, in which case you did not legally consent? Sounds like a double standard . . .
Although it does sound like a double standard, it really isn’t. One is asking whether you did something wrong. The other is asking whether you are a victim. They’re two different concepts, with different factors to consider.
It helps to think of rape as an assault. Take the sex part out of it, and just think of it like any other offense done to another person’s body.
A boxer willingly entering the ring has consented to any punches he might receive according to the rules of the game. He is not a victim of an assault. A sleeping person who gets punched in the face has not consented, the puncher knew it wasn’t consented to, and so he’s obviously a victim.
If a boxer got someone so drunk he couldn’t understand what he was doing, and put him in the ring, and punched him, we’d call that an assault for sure. Same for rape.
But whether someone’s a victim is different from whether he should be punished for his acts.
Over the centuries, our law has come to the conclusion that getting yourself drunk enough to commit a crime is bad enough that we’ll hold you responsible for any crimes you then commit. You intentionally put yourself in a state where you could harm others, so we’re going to transfer that intent to the harm you then caused. We’re not going to let you get away with it because you didn’t know what you were doing at the time. It’s still your fault that you were in that state, and so it’s your fault that you did it.
Does that help?
Actually, you’re not the first to ask this. After dashing off this quick response, I wrote out a longer version over on my blog. Feel free to check it out if you like.
On a somewhat related note, there are countries where being drunk or intoxicated is an aggravating circumstance that can be applied to any crime if the judge decide so. And most of the “serious” crimes (i.e., rape, murder, heavy physical harm, etc.) have “being intoxicated” as an explicitly worded aggravating circumstance so the judge HAS to apply it when considering the sentence. So there you have “diminished capacity anti-defense”, so to speak.