Insanity defense

Oh, oh, oh.

Not guilty by reason of insanity, by the cold, and then highly inappropriate.

Out of all four, which one was your favorite?

Okay.

It just makes no sense.

So, that one, I couldn't really.

Not guilty by reason of insanity.

It's...

They determined that he wasn't mentally competent to stand trial.

In January of 1958, Ed was sent to Central State Hospital for the Criminally Insane in Waupon, Wisconsin.

He stayed there for the next 10 years.

There was no trial, no verdict, and no closure for anyone involved.

A panel of psychologists did indeed deem him insane, and so he was found not guilty by reason of insanity.

And rather than ending up in prison, he was instead sent to Wisconsin's Central State Hospital for the Criminally Insane, where he stayed for the rest of his life.

Frank finally died in 1943.

As for the rest of Roosevelt's life, well, until the day he died, TR went about with this bullet Trank had shot him with, lodged in his chest.

Time passed, and over the course of four days, a psychologist named Sean Robinson came to conduct an extensive evaluation of him.

In September of 2020, he found that Eli did indeed meet the criteria to be found not guilty by reason of insanity.

These days, it's fairly rare for an insanity defense to work, signifying that his level of mental illness was indeed extreme.

The psychologist said, At the time and date of the offense, Michael Elijah Walker was mentally ill, and during the commission of the offense, he was also suffering from a mental illness rendering him unable to differentiate between right and wrong, and unable to understand the nature and consequences of his actions.

And when the judge asked James directly, like, do you understand? Do you have any questions about what's happening? He said, no.

And the judge said of James Holmes, and I quote, I find Mr. Holmes understands the effects and consequences of the not guilty by reason of insanity plea.

He was looking at the advisement and appeared to be following along.

So essentially what we were left with at that time was if the jury was to find James not guilty by reason of insanity, he would be placed into a mental health facility where he would stay indefinitely.

And he also said that he had contemplated just killing himself instead of killing other people.

But instead he came up with this life capital plan where essentially he For every person he killed, more value would be bestowed upon him and his life.

the defense told the jury, um, as like a last attempt to try to get him off on the insanity plea that he was going through a psychotic break when he entered theater nine and committed all the murders that he committed and that he was delusional believing that by killing people, he was adding more value to his life and that by just injuring people or leaving them grieving, this added no value to his life at all.

And that all of these people were just collateral damage, um, for his bigger overall plan to make himself somehow more valuable.

Most serial murderers are not psychotic, but Ed seemed to have the symptoms of some form of psychosis.

Gein was sent to the Central State Hospital for the Criminally Insane in Waupun, Wisconsin, which is now a maximum security prison.

70 miles away in Plainfield, the community was trying to get back on its feet, but the shadow of Ed Gein lingered over the town.

In 1958, the property that- that Gein had lived in was- is due to be auctioned off, and I think the last thing that local people wanted was for this to become some kind of shrine, some kind of attraction for people who were morbidly fascinated.

[laughs]

Uh, he was committed to the Central State Hospital for the Criminally Insane in Waupun, Wisconsin, where-

Nice

...

Chopped him up.

When I say we need more of that, I don't mean we need president shooters.

We need more hospitals for the criminally insane.

That's what I think.

I don't remember.

Anyway, um, this one is gonna be called Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity.

Spoiling it.

[laughs]

Nice.

So that's my drink.

And today, shockingly, we're gonna talk about being not guilty by reason of insanity.

Okay.

Ed was arrested, and when questioned by authorities, he said, "He just wanted to see what it felt like to kill Grandma." He was interviewed by a psychiatrist and was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic.

His crimes were deemed incomprehensible for a 15-year-old boy, and he was sent to the Criminally Insane unit of Atascadero State Hospital.

Ed saw numerous psychiatrists, doctors, and social workers while incarcerated.

They started with the belief that he was a paranoid schizophrenic, but came to disagree with court psychiatrists' diagnosis.