Case Study 5: Mental Disorder Law Case Study Paper

Case Study 5: Mental Disorders
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Case Study 5: Mental Disorders
Concerns more often emerge regarding a criminal defendant's possibility of mental disorders at one point or another in the course of criminal proceedings, including during arrests, preliminary hearing, trials, sentencing, incarceration, and release decision making actions. The mental health disorders have significant relevance on the criminal justice system, where mental disorder can even preclude the defendant from participating in the trial or remedy the capability of the offence, as contextualized in the case of Dusky v. the United States 1960 (Gay, Vitacco & Ragatz, 2017). However, the concept of mental disorder within the precincts of criminal justice is an issue of contestation and volatility: mental disorders and their associated symptoms often lead to variant legal outcomes depending on case scenarios
Compare and Contrast three key similarities and three key differences between mental illnesses and mental disorders. Provide one example of each similarity and difference to support your answer.
Mental illness and mental disorders are often used by mental health professionals interchangeably. However, the two terminologies may denote similar and different meanings in the sphere of mental health. The American Psychiatric Association describes mental illnesses as health conditions that entail changes in emotion, thinking, or behavior or a combination of these three items and are associated with distress and possible malfunctioning in social, work, or family activities. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) defines mental disorders in using five fundamental factors and features (American Psychiatric Association., 2013). First, a mental disorder is either a psychological or behavioral syndrome or patterns that happen to an individual. Second, a mental disorder is a representation of underlying psychobiological disorder. Third, results of mental disorder are associated with clinically significant distress, for example, malfunctioning essential areas. Fourth, mental disorders should not be a mere reaction and expected responses to everyday life stressors and losses. Finally, a mental disorder should constitute social deviance in society.
From the two definitions of mental illness and mental disorders, it is possible to identify both similarities and differences between the two terms. First, both mental illness and disorders have an aspect of malfunctioning in given areas of life, for example, family, life, or work. Second, the two terms may have similar root causes, for example, biochemical causes. Both two terms have and aspect of social deviance, e.g., the people with mental illness and disorders are at greater risk of criminal behaviors, which constitute social deviance patterns.
Differences also exist between mental illness and mental disorder. First, Szasz, who is psychiatrist considered mental illness as a myth, but argues that mental disorder is a valid point (Aftab, 2014). To press this point, we may argue that illness is a disease which results from the pathological process, but we know that the said ‘mental illness may not always result from pathological processes. Second, the disease of the mind is inconceivable because the mind or mental is non-physical. Third, cases of ‘mental illnesses’ should be considered as mental or brain disorders, for example, schizophrenia and bipolar disorders.
Examine the potential stressor (s) that could have triggered the defendant to act out in criminal behavior. Next, hypothesize whether or not the defendant would have been a good candidate for the treatment of his/her mental illness. Justify your responses.
In some instances, stressors have led to criminal behaviors among individuals. More often, crimes also occur partly as a result of stress. Individuals commit crimes due to greed, revenge, anger, jealousy, and pride, and these forms of feelings can prompt crime. However, other beforehand feelings can act as precursors to crime: this may revolve around psychological stress issues. Stress factors that are associated with criminal behaviors may include individual, institutions, and family-based. Individual factors such as lack of social support, debts including mortgages and rent arrears, impaired physical and mental health, involvement in crome at an early age, and relationship breakdown are key stressors that bring an intricate interplay leading to the propensity of criminal behavior. Family backgrounds, including sexual abuse, physical abuse, and family breakdowns, alcoholism, especially during childhood and adolescence, increases the risk of criminal behavior in an individual. An institution like the military or prisons may make one depict criminal behavior. Arguably, stressful life is one of the significant precursors that often lead to criminal behavior.
In some cases, stressful life leads to mental disorders that impact someone's behavior in terms of criminal tendencies. For example, including post-traumatic stress disorders among military personnel can often lead to criminal acts. A case example revolves around thousands of U.S troops who returned from various deployments, including Iraq and Afghanistan, who have shown a high prevalence of mood disorders, substance abuse, high suicide rates, difficulty adapting to civilian life, and increased have reported increased incidents of post-traumatic stress disorder (Elbogen at al.,2014; Frierson, 2013). According to Frierson, Persons with post-traumatic stress disorder (PSD) are at greater risk of arrest for criminal domestic violence and other crimes, in which the veteran soldiers who have PTSD are two to three times more likely to be violent and aggressive toward a female partner than are veterans without PTSD. Frierson noted that approximately 50 % of former military men with PTSD, who served in the Vietnam War, have been given lifetime arrest for various criminal offenses. The issue of PTSD in the context of veteran military soldiers has brought to the core the issue of legal insanity. It has been hypothesized that the relationship of a dissociative reaction to criminal behavior when veteran soldiers enter a survival mode being brought on by an environmental stimulus reminiscent of the combat trauma. It is an issue of an unconscious defence regarding the criminal act, which has brought successful insanity defense in a case involving a Vietnam War veteran solder. It is suitable to consider an insanity defense based on PTSD symptoms in contexts in which criminal acts occur during a dissociative flashback. Behaviors during dissociative flashbacks are more often unpremeditated and sudden and reflect uncharacteristic of the individual (Frierson, 2013). Usually, retrievable history traumatic combat events ...