Image acknowledgment : National Archives
On a Sunday afternoon in Washington , D.C. , in 1859 , Philip Barton Key , Word of the man who wrote “ The Star Spangled Banner , ” stood in the park and undulate his hankie in the air travel . He was attempting to signal his girlfriend , Teresa Sickles , who lived across the street , so that they could sneak out for a date .
Someone parted the curtains in a window of Sickles ’ home and find out Key for a few minutes , but it was not Teresa . It was her married man Daniel , a well - known pol ( at odd in photo above ) . He continued to watch as Key attempt to call up to Teresa ’s window . He had known for several hebdomad that Key was sleeping with his married woman . Worse , his friend and neighbor had known , too .
take in his wife ’s lover phone upon her in full view of everyone on the street right in front of him , Sickles lost it . Consumed by rage , he catch two handguns from his bedroom and surprise out of the house , across the street and into the park . He lead up to Key , yell , “ Key , you villain , you have dishonored my home . You must give out . You must give out ! You must die out ! ”
Sickles fired several sentence at Key , expunge him in the leg and in the hand . Key seize Sickles ’ lapels and the two men make do on the dry land , in full view of the homes of Washington ’s elite group . Sickles pulled away , stood and drew his 2nd pistol . Key suck the only weapon he had , a span of opera glasses , and threw them at his assailant . sickle fired and hit Key near the groyne . fall back against a fence , Key pleaded for his animation .
Sickles indicate the gun at the heart of Key ’s chest of drawers and give notice . Key staggered away , dying a few minutes subsequently . reap hook stepped back and look around . At least a twelve people had witnessed the full thing . Sickles fly and surrendered to the police a few hours later at a friend ’s sign , where he was charged with murder and taken to jail .
As a former congresswoman , Sickles enjoy sure fringe benefit during pre - trial detainment . So many people came to wish him well that he was given use of the gaoler ’s apartment to entertain his guests , among them Congressmen and other high - spirit level members of the federal government . President James Buchanan did not make a sojourn , but did transport Sickles a personal note . During this metre , Sickles secured several far-famed politician as his defence attorney , include Edwin M. Stanton , who would after become Lincoln ’s Secretary of War . And the whole clock time he was detained , Sickles was also allowed to keep a weapon on his person .
Even though the proceedings were outrageous even by today ’s standard of prime - clip - quick crime and celebrity defendants , it is not Key ’s murder or the maverick childbed for which we remember Daniel Sickles . It is for what he did next : told the court that he should be determine innocent of the crime due to reasonableness of insanity , something that no one in America had ever done before .
Slipping Into Insanity
Insane people have been doing insane things and getting in fuss for it since the dawn of mankind . For most of that time , it ’s also been possible that being insane could get you off the hook . Leniency toward a criminal who exhibit a genial illness was common in ancient Greece and Rome , and later fan out throughout Europe . In the Middle Ages in England and Western Europe , the courts often either spared the insane the trial by ordeal of a trial and simply committed them to an asylum , or find them shamed and then straightaway referred the pillowcase to the king for a purple forgiveness .
In other America , the law often made no differentiation between criminal insanity and other condemnable behavior , but the court sometimes exonerate the mentally ill because of their condition anyway . One notable case was Richard Lawrence , the unemployed mansion cougar who was the first somebody charged with the attempted assassination of a U.S. President of the United States . ( Lawrence believed that he was heir to the British throne and enkindle two shooting iron at Andrew Jackson because he thought the prexy was machinate to keep him from claiming his kingdom . )
The M’Naghten Rules
The modern insanity defense , at least in the Western world , can be trace back to the cause of Daniel M’Naghten , who believed he was the mark of a confederacy headed by the pope and the British meridian minister . In 1843 , M’Naghten attempted to waylay Prime Minister Robert Peel at 10 Downing Street , but attacked and kill Peel ’s secretary instead .
During his trial , several shrink prove M’Naghten and testified that he was delusional ; the panel acquitted him by reason of insanity . Public scandal survey the verdict and prompted the House of Lords to convoke a exceptional academic session where they posed a series of hypothetical question about insanity and the law to a panel of judge . The standards and precept discussed by the panel found their fashion into common law and became known as the M’Naghten dominion .
consort to the rules , the suspect can use the insanity defense and may be acquitted if , “ at the time of the commission of the acts institute the offense , the suspect , as a result of a severe mental disease or defect , was unable to appreciate the nature and quality of the wrongfulness of his act . ” This standard is also known as the " right - wrong " test .
Twenty - five U.S. land still use a variation of the M’Naghten linguistic rule for insanity defenses . Twenty states and the District of Columbia use the novel and less restrictive Model Penal Code Standard give by the American Law Institute in 1962 . Under this rule , the defendant is not held reprehensively responsible if , “ at the prison term of his demeanor as a result of mental disease or desert the defendant lack strong capacity either to appreciate the criminalism of his conduct or to adapt his conduct to the prerequisite of law . ” The rest states have blackball the use of the insanity Defense Department .
The Sickles Trial
At test , the jury was take in on the Georgia home boy opera dramaturgy that led up to Key ’s death . The dupe was the District Attorney for the capital , the son of the man who wrote the national hymn , a close protagonist of his killer and , according to local gossip , “ the openhanded mankind in all Washington society . ” The suspect was a well - connect Congressman from New York with a reputation as a ladies ' human beings . He ’d been censured for bringing a prostitute onto the base of the New York State Senate , and had marry his significant 15 - yr - old wife against her family ’s compliments when he was 33 . Despite his ill fame , Sickles and his married woman had been welcomed into Washington ’s most elect societal circles after Daniel was elected to Congress . They became fast friend with Key , and Daniel often asked Key to escort his wife to societal case whenever the representative had to work late or was occupied with a lady friend or one - dark stand . Key and Teresa ’s friendship quickly became wild-eyed .
They stress to keep the social function clandestine , and Key even rented a household in a rough Washington neck of the woods so they could get together in private , away from their friends and colleagues . Despite the precautions , the romance became coarse noesis in Sickles and Key ’s social circle . Eventually , Daniel received an anon. letter detailing his married woman ’s unfaithfulness . He confronted Teresa and forced her to compose a detailed letter of the alphabet of confession , which she did . By the end of the month , Key was dead .
Sickles ’ lawyer , Edwin Stanton , indicate that Sickles had been drive temporarily harebrained with heartache by his married woman ’s infidelity and the embarrassing way in which he found out about it . Sickles , he argue , was not in his right head when he attack Key , and hence could not be held accountable for his actions . In the homage of public persuasion , Sickles had already been realize , and he was applauded in coverage of the trial for fall down his delusory admirer and protect the wives of the balance of Washington ’s robust and powerful from a home wrecker . The jury followed wooing and acquitted Sickles of the charges .
The Aftermath
straight off after the trial , Sickles forgave his married woman , and undid all the grace he had built up among the press and public . Her perfidy had have the demise of a man , the editorials cried , and no good man would have taken her back . Sickles ’ popularity in Washington and in New York plummeted and he had no Bob Hope of winning reelection to Congress . He fall home to New York in 1861 , unemployed and disgraced .
The Civil War broke out a few month later , giving Sickles a fortune at a fresh beginning . He took charge of an foot brigade and fought in several battles . After a round shot mangled his pegleg at Gettysburg , he retire from the army with a Medal of Honor and donate the bones from his cut off leg to the Army Medical Museum , reportedly visiting each yr on the anniversary of the amputation . ( The National Museum of Health and Medicine still has the bone on show today . )
Image credit : Library of Congress
Sickles plump on to become the embassador to Spain ( where he garner the soubriquet the “ Yankee King of Spain ” ) , chairman of the New York State Monuments Commission , United States President of the New York State Board of Civil Service Commissioners , sheriff of New York , and was even re - elect to congress . He died of natural lawsuit on May 3 , 1914 , and was buried in Arlington National Cemetery .
The Legacy
Since Sickles ' historical plea , many illustrious criminals have used the insanity defense with mixed resultant role , including Jeffrey Dahmer , John Hinckley , John Wayne Gacy , and John duPont , the multimillionaire heir to a chemical company hazard who polish off an Olympic wrestler he believed was part of an outside conspiracy to obliterate him .
But according to the National Institute of Mental Health , the defense is invoked in less than 1 % of felony cases , and is then only successful about a fourth of the clip . Even if a suspect is exculpate for reasons of insanity , they are still normally institutionalized for treatment for several long time or even decades .
