High Court Puts Insanity Defense in Peril : Law: Justices decline to review assault conviction of schizophrenic Montana man. This gives states a green light to end the long-used protection.

The Supreme Court on Monday gave states a green light to abolish the traditional insanity defense by declining to review the assault conviction of a schizophrenic Montana man.

Without comment or dissent, the high court refused to hear the man’s claim that the Constitution forbids convicting an insane person of a criminal act.

Although the court’s action does not carry the weight of an actual ruling, it strongly suggests that the justices do not believe the Constitution requires states to permit defendants to employ the insanity defense.

Throughout American history, state courts have accepted the view that a mentally deranged person cannot be held legally responsible for a crime. But the tide began to turn in recent decades as some lawmakers disputed whether a defendant’s claim of insanity was reason enough to free him from a conviction.

In 1979, Montana became the first state to abolish the insanity defense from its criminal code and Idaho and Utah followed suit. After John W. Hinckley Jr. was acquitted by reason of insanity for the attempted assassination of then-President Ronald Reagan in 1981, Congress in 1984 tightened the requirements for an insanity plea.

The Supreme Court has said little through the years about the insanity defense, although some justices agreed with the critics who said that it is not a necessary element of criminal law. For example, then-Justice William H. Rehnquist in 1985 said it is “highly doubtful that (the Constitution) requires a state to make available an insanity defense to a criminal defendant.”

The issue came before the court in the case of a deranged Montana man who viciously attacked a forest ranger with a tree-planting tool and then stood quietly nearby until police arrived.

Psychiatrists testified that the defendant, Joe Junior Cowan, suffered from paranoia and hallucinations. The police reported that he had a habit of breaking into cabins, eating the food and watching television. When discovered, he would react violently to what he viewed as an invasion of his home.

On the evening of April 24, 1990, Forest Service employee Maggie Doherty returned to her cabin in a remote area near Missoula, Mont., to find food missing and her television set on. When she saw a suspicious-looking man standing outside, she locked the doors and phoned for help.

But Cowan, enraged, broke down the door and attacked her with a large metal tool. She suffered broken bones and other injuries but survived. When deputies arrived, they found Cowan standing a few feet away. He did not flee or resist.

At his trial, his defense lawyers said that Cowan suffered from “paranoid schizophrenia.” Under Montana law, however, prosecutors had to prove only that he “knowingly” and “purposely” committed the assault. Because his delusional behavior seemed to wax and wane, a judge agreed Cowan knew right from wrong and had knowingly and deliberately assaulted the Forest Service employee. He was convicted of attempted murder and sentenced to 60 years.

Last year, the Montana Supreme Court upheld his criminal conviction.

In his appeal to the high court, his lawyers said that the case presented “an ideal vehicle for settling the question” of whether the Constitution requires that truly insane defendants have a right to be acquitted of criminal wrongdoing. His appeal said that it violates “due process of law” and is “cruel and unusual punishment” to convict a deranged person.

“No one disagreed that he is suffering from a mental disease, but under Montana law, he is being punished as a criminal rather than being treated as an ill person,” said Margaret Borg, a lawyer who represented Cowan.

However, the high court refused to hear the appeal in the case (Cowan vs. Montana, 93-1264).

Meanwhile, the court also let stand the conviction of two white Illinois men, who were charged with arson and federal civil rights violations in a cross-burning case. The men, who lived in the small all-white town of Keeneyville, west of Chicago, set the cross aflame near the home of a neighbor who had entertained black visitors.

The legal outcome appears to conflict with a 1992 high court ruling that struck down an anti-cross burning law from St. Paul, Minn. on free-speech grounds. But the lower courts said that this case (Hayward vs. U.S., 93-1063) differs because the Illinois men were charged with arson and civil rights violations, not with offensive expressions.

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