Adamantium wrote:
There is no medication for Aspergers.
Many people with ASDs take medication for comorbid conditions, though being a bigot isn't one of them.
The lawyer could have brought up the medication for the actual thing it treats, rather than "Aspergers."
He could have but it would have been an inferior defense strategy. The defense lawyer's job is not to be as clinically accurate as possible. His job is to say whatever he can to defend his client and get the charges reduced or dropped or the client acquitted.
Bringing up Aspergers
has been a successful defense strategy in some trials. As long as it works, a defense lawyer
should bring it up. A defense lawyer who does not is incompetent to defend a client with Aspergers.
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_an ... fense.htmlQuote:
If (or when) McKinnon does get extradited, his "Asperger's defense" might still come in handy. Criminal defendants in the United States have been using similar tactics with varying degrees of success in recent years. In fact, it's not all that rare for criminal defendants with Asperger's to argue for leniency in cases of computer fraud, sexual misconduct, and murder. Three years ago, the defense even made its way into an episode of Boston Legal.
How does this gambit work? One of the hallmarks of having Asperger's is a severe difficulty navigating social situations. This awkwardness appears to stem from an inability to detect facial expressions and other social cues; people with autism and Asperger's display a notable lack of empathy for others. Indeed, a 2004 study (PDF) found that both disorders are associated with low scores on a test designed to measure social awareness and compassion. Defense lawyers have argued that violent criminals with Asperger's may therefore be incapable of understanding the harm they're inflicting on another human being.
That was more or less the tactic used by the team representing Robert Durst, a real estate heir who killed and dismembered his neighbor in 2001. Durst was charged with first-degree murder, but a psychiatrist testified that his actions were the result of emotional deficits and impulsive behavior associated with Asperger's—so the crime could not have been premeditated. The argument worked, and Durst was acquitted.Most judges and juries have been unconvinced that Asperger's can explain or excuse violent behavior, though. Last month, a judge in the United Kingdom sentenced a 22-year-old woman with Asperger's to life in prison for beating her mother to death, saying her lack of empathy didn't reduce the gravity of the crime.
There is much to disagree with in the article that I linked and quoted. What can't be disagreed with is that it is a defense strategy that a defense lawyer should use if they are defending a client with Aspergers. To disagree with its' use as a defense strategy is to misunderstand the job of defense lawyers.
Defense lawyers will stop using it when it stops
ever working. I don't know how many times it has to fail as a defense strategy before the defense lawyers purge it from their arsenal of tactics. But every time it
does work, that extends its' usefulness and insures it will still be used.
This has implications for the AS community. As long as it continues to work at least now and then, it will be to the benefit of any AS person who is arrested. The flipside of that is it continues the impression in the public's mind that AS can predispose to criminal behaviour. It's a conundrum.
23 Jan 2014, 10:28 am
