Mental Illness

A recent  article by Prof. Jeffrey Kirchmeier of the City University of New York School of Law entitled, "The Undiscovered Country: Execution Competency & Comprehending Death" explores whether mentally disabled inmates who do not understand that execution means the end of their physical life should be spared. Kirchmeier examines Supreme Court precedent under the Eighth Amendment that requires that a condemned defendant be competent in order to be executed. The article argues that the penological goals of the death penalty could not be fulfilled unless the condemned person comprehends what his death means. Kirchmeier writes, "Those who do not comprehend death are not as a category a group of people who will be deterred by the death penalty more than life in prison, and such persons will not be able to appreciate the moral condemnation designed to be delivered by the death penalty." The article also discusses a standard for comprehension of death consistent with earlier Court rulings. Click here to read the full article.

A recent article in the Fayetteville Observer in North Carolina captures the poignant story of one man's life on death row.  James Floyd Davis is a Vietnam veteran who lashed out with a burst of violence fourteen years ago, killing three people including his boss who had fired him a few days before.  He suffers from mental illness and post-traumatic stress disorder.  Through the intervention of a therapist who also served in Vietnam, it was learned that Davis was entitled to a Purple Heart and other medals earned during his service.  The army agreed to award him the medals and the prison eventually agreed to let him receive them.  The reporter, Chick Jacobs, sums up the story this way: "This is a story of how one veteran, wounded in body and spirit, reached into the demon-filled darkness of a fellow veteran who lost his way long ago. It's the unlikely tale of how a medal earned in one horror helped bring a touch of humanity to another."  The entire article can be read below:

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals recently ruled that a death row inmate who removed his only remaining eye and ate it “is clearly ‘crazy,’ but he is also ‘sane’ under Texas law,” rejecting his appeal.  Death row inmate Andre Thomas had stabbed some of his family members and ripped their hearts out. He then walked into the Sherman Police Department, admitted to the killings, and said God told him to commit them. Shortly after his arrest, he removed his right eye in 2004.  In December 2008, a death row officer found Thomas with a bloody face and it was determined that he had removed his left eye and eaten it.  Thomas had been to hospitals twice prior to his arrest for mental health issues, but had not received treatment. Judge Cathy Cochran, writing for the court, said, "This is an extraordinarily tragic case,'' because the deaths could have been avoided if Thomas had been treated.

Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights (MVFHR) and the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) are working together to launch a national project concerned with the intersection of the capital punishment system and people with severe mental illness.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court recently ruled that the state can force two death row inmates to take anti-psychotic medication so they are mentally competent enough to proceed with their appeals and be executed. The two inmates were sentenced to death but were found incompetent to participate in the appeals filed on their behalf. The U.S. Supreme Court has held that mentally incompetent inmates may not be executed.