Not So Fast!

The Guilty Mind: Psychiatry and the Law of Homicide, by John Biggs, Jr. 236 pp. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co. $4.50

A defendant pleading insanity in a homicide case is, under the M’Naghton Rules, adjudged sane (and so responsible for his criminal violence) if his actions at the time of the crime indicate knowledge of right and wrong, or knowledge of the nature of his act. And this book, which outlines the changes in the law that would result from a judicial recognition of psychiatric data bearing on the issue of criminal intent, goes far to explain why so many courts, shying away from the influence of psychiatry and the psychiatrists, have stuck to the old rules.

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Stanley Parry

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The Guilty Mind: Psychiatry and the Law of Homicide, by John Biggs, Jr. 236 pp. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co. $4.50

A defendant pleading insanity in a homicide case is, under the M’Naghton Rules, adjudged sane (and so responsible for his criminal violence) if his actions at the time of the crime indicate knowledge of right and wrong, or knowledge of the nature of his act. And this book, which outlines the changes in the law that would result from a judicial recognition of psychiatric data bearing on the issue of criminal intent, goes far to explain why so many courts, shying away from the influence of psychiatry and the psychiatrists, have stuck to the old rules.