According to the Law and Justice Foundation, a mentally ill person is someone who suffers a mental illness where, owing to that illness, there are reasonable grounds for believing that care, treatment or control of the person is necessary, for their own or others' protection.
Under Section 27 of the Criminal Code, every person is presumed to be of sound mind or to have been of sound mind at any time where such question is raised, until the contrary is proved.
Section 28 of the Criminal Code further states that a person would not be responsible for any act or omission done by him of at the time of doing such act or omission, he is affected by delusions which deprives him of the capacity to understand what he is doing.
Where a person is arraigned before the court for committing an offence, and he raises the plea of insanity, the court will weigh the evidence before it to determine if that person indeed suffers from a mental illness. If due to the evidence before the court, a person's plea of insanity succeeds, he will not be sent to prison.
What the courts will do instead is to remand such an individual in an asylum or hospital, at the pleasure of the governor of that state. This is done in accordance with Section 230 of the Criminal Procedure Act.
The only way such an individual can be discharged from the asylum is only by amnesty granted by the governor based on a psychiatrist's report indicating that the person is no longer a danger to himself or others.
An application would also be made by the relative or friend of the detained person with the undertaking that the person discharged to the care of the relative or friend will be prevented from harming himself or others.
Content created and supplied by: Busayomi (via Opera News )
COMMENTS