Insanity pleas have probably been around since the dawn of the human race. Had any one, other than God, been around to cry for justice, Cain would probably have copped an insanity plea. It seems that anytime a person is accused of murder and the act itself leaves no doubt, the first line of defense is either innocent by reason of insanity or at worst, a crime of passion. The defense is usually grasping at straws, at least until something more solid is stumbled across and a very good lawyer can always find a loophole in our American justice system.

Our too lenient justice system sometimes makes it even harder to remove a person, even when there is no question of guilt, from society and place them where they can do no more harm to an unsuspecting public. More often than we would care to believe, a killer is turned loose on a technicality. Every state has its own particular laws and every good judge and lawyer can read their own interpretation into those laws and in turn, every good juror does their best to interpret the interpretations.

Expert witnesses are called and some are paid handsomely for this service to inform the court of all the nuances of true insanity and answer some of the questions that are plaguing us all. Could a sane person become insane for a short period then become sane again? Could an insane person plan and carry out as heinous a crime as Andrea Yates did and still be considered too mentally impaired to know right from wrong? She knew in her heart that her mother-in-law and her husband---not to mention the rest of the world---would consider what she was doing wrong, but she thought it right.

How could she not be considered responsible for her actions?

Medical experts, whether having practiced for many years or just having received a crash course on the internet about certain stages of mental illness,

tell us that it is quite common for a truly insane person to show incredible forethought and intelligence prior to or during the commission of some unbelievable crimes. Serial killers for instance would have to be insane to commit the crimes that they do and yet they manage to cover up their misdeeds and to elude being captured sometimes for many years or are never caught at all. Could not they be judged too insane to be guilty of their actions?

If Andrea Yates managed to convince everyone around her, including her doctors, that she was capable of going through life as a normal human being,

then she should be capable of suffering the consequences of her actions.

But also, lawmakers of Texas should tighten the screws down on some of these governmental agencies that should be trying harder to protect the innocent lives of all these small children that they are losing.

Sane or insane, Andrea Yates committed a crime, a crime that only God could forgive. She took the lives of babies that she was bound by all that is holy to protect. And if she is not truly insane and knew full well what she was doing, then may God have mercy on her soul for she will always hear the footsteps of the postman.

END

Sandra E. Graham, author of Amos Jakey, published by American Book Publishing and soon to be followed by Nicolina and Ernestine.