Word: hinckley
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...Hinckley survives a suicide...
This time, John Hinckley was resolved that a death would occur. He had failed to kill President Reagan on a Washington sidewalk last March, and he had failed to kill himself two months later, in a North Carolina prison, by taking an overdose of painkillers. In the stockade at Fort Meade, Md., last week, Hinckley jammed the lock to his cell with a piece of cracker-box cardboard. Then he stood on a chair, knotted one sleeve of an Army field jacket around his neck and the other to an iron window bar and, as U.S. marshals shouted...
Should John Hinckley spend the rest of his life in prison? Or was he so psychologically troubled when he shot President Reagan and three other men last March that society should not hold him accountable for his actions? That is the decision that will soon confront twelve jurors in Washington, D.C. If they accept the contention of Hinckley's lawyers that he was legally insane, the would-be assassin will be confined to a mental hospital until a judge concludes that he is no longer a threat to himself or fellow citizens. Then he may go scot free...
...courts, have adopted variants of a model developed by the American Law Institute. Commonly referred to as the Brawner rule, it acquits a defendant who lacks "substantial capacity" either to know right from wrong or to conform to the law. This is the test that will be used in Hinckley's trial...
Despite such attitudes, observers believe that Hinckley Defense Attorney Vincent Fuller will parade his client's life and idiosyncracies before the jury in hopes of winning a shorter sentence, even if his insanity plea is rejected. Some feel, however, that Hinckley's wealthy background will count against him. Jurors, insists Washington Defense Attorney Lawrence Schwartz, will ask: "With all this opportunity, what right does he have to do this? " -By Bennett H. Beach. Reported by Evan Thomas/Washington