{"id":634,"date":"2012-08-03T13:05:38","date_gmt":"2012-08-03T13:05:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vtjuryinstructions.org\/?page_id=634"},"modified":"2026-02-13T19:17:24","modified_gmt":"2026-02-13T19:17:24","slug":"insanity","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/vtjuryinstructions.org\/?page_id=634","title":{"rendered":"Insanity"},"content":{"rendered":"<ul>\n<li>CR07-176.\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.vtjuryinstructions.org\/criminal\/MS07-176.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Insanity Defense<\/a>, 13 V.S.A. \u00a7 4801 (06\/10\/24)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Reporter&#8217;s Note<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The statute, 13 V.S.A. \u00a7 4801, places the burden of proof on the defendant.\u00a0 The Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the statute in State v. Messier, 145 Vt. 622 (1985).\u00a0 The statute does not relieve the State\u2019s burden of proving all of the essential elements \u2013 including any mental element, beyond a reasonable doubt.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">In 2024, the Committee revised the insanity instruction to better track the statutory language, as reflected in Judge Pacht\u2019s jury instructions in\u00a0<u>State v. Aita Gurung<\/u>, 3261-9-19 Cncr. The revised instruction now uses the language \u201clacked adequate capacity.\u201d <em>See also<\/em> <u>State v. Gurung<\/u>, 2025 VT 52, \u00b6\u00b6\u00a046\u201362 (affirming trial court\u2019s refusal to instruct jury on consequences of a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity, and trial court\u2019s supplemental instruction in response to a jury question about the wording of the insanity test).<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">For discussion on the interaction between diminished capacity and insanity,\u00a0<em>see<\/em>\u00a0<u>State v. Webster<\/u>, 2017 VT 98, \u00b6 20, 206 Vt. 178 (\u201cDiminished capacity and insanity are related concepts pertaining to defendant\u2019s state of mind at the time of the offense\u201d; however, while defendant must prove affirmative defense of insanity, diminished capacity \u201cis an attempt to defeat the State\u2019s obligation to show the necessary intent to commit the crime\u201d);\u00a0<u>State v. Bourgoin<\/u>, 2021 VT 15, \u00b6\u00b6 25\u00ad\u201327 (trial court did not err by not instructing jury on its own motion that State\u2019s expert\u2019s sanity opinion was irrelevant to defendant\u2019s claimed diminished capacity, where \u201cState never claimed . . . that [expert\u2019s]\u00a0<u>ultimate opinion<\/u>\u00a0on defendant\u2019s sanity was relevant to whether defendant had the requisite intent to commit second-degree murder\u201d and where \u201cboth defendant . . . and the trial court . . . emphasized the distinction between determining whether defendant was insane and determining whether he had the requisite\u00a0intent to commit second-degree murder\u201d).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CR07-176.\u00a0 Insanity Defense, 13 V.S.A. \u00a7 4801 (06\/10\/24) Reporter&#8217;s Note The statute, 13 V.S.A. \u00a7 4801, places the burden of proof on the defendant.\u00a0 The Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the statute in State v. Messier, 145 Vt. 622 &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/vtjuryinstructions.org\/?page_id=634\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":604,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-634","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vtjuryinstructions.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/634","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vtjuryinstructions.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vtjuryinstructions.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vtjuryinstructions.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vtjuryinstructions.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=634"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/vtjuryinstructions.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/634\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1850,"href":"https:\/\/vtjuryinstructions.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/634\/revisions\/1850"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vtjuryinstructions.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vtjuryinstructions.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}