insanity-defense
27 cases — ← All topics
| Case | Title | Lower Court | Docketed | Status | Flags | Tags | Question Presented |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 25-111 | Timothy Carver v. United States | Sixth Circuit | 2025-07-30 | Denied | Response Waived | criminal-procedure due-process expert-testimony insanity-defense mental-defect neurodegenerative-disease | 1. Whether the appellate court erred in affirming the district court's rejection of Mr. Carver's insanity defense, where expert medical testimony esta… |
| 24-6822 | Jorge Almeida v. Ricky D. Dixon, Secretary, Florida Department of Corrections | Eleventh Circuit | 2025-03-21 | Denied | Response WaivedIFP | due-process ineffective-assistance insanity-defense mens-rea mental-disease specific-intent | I. Almeida received Ineffective Assistance of Counsel as a result of his trial counsel's strategy of conceding guilt to lesser included offenses inste… |
| 24-6646 | Randy Allen Herman, Jr. v. Ricky D. Dixon, Secretary, Florida Department of Corrections | Eleventh Circuit | 2025-02-25 | Denied | Response WaivedIFP | criminal-procedure fourteenth-amendment ineffective-assistance-of-counsel insanity-defense involuntary-act sixth-amendment | Whether Petitioner was deprived of effective assistance of counsel in violation of his Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constituti… |
| 24-910 | Charles Ray Crawford v. Burl Cain, Commissioner, Mississippi Department of Corrections, et al. | Fifth Circuit | 2025-02-24 | Denied | ake-standard due-process ineffective-assistance insanity-defense mental-health-expert sixth-amendment | In Ake v. Oklahoma, 470 U.S. 68 (1985), this Court clearly established that the State must provide indigent criminal defendants whose mental condition… | |
| 24-6542 | William Michael Dennis v. Chance Andes, Acting Warden | Ninth Circuit | 2025-02-11 | Denied | Response WaivedIFP | due-process ineffective-assistance insanity-defense mental-state strickland-standard trial-counsel | Whether the Court of Appeals decided an important federal question in a way that conflicts with relevant decisions of this Court by finding trial coun… |
| 23-6078 | Timothy Ray Jones, Jr. v. South Carolina | South Carolina | 2023-11-21 | Denied | IFP | capital-punishment capital-sentencing due-process eighth-amendment insanity-defense jury jury-instructions not-guilty-by-reason-of-insanity voir-dire | 1. Whether the Due Process Clause and the Eighth Amendment require that a jury, as the sentencer in a capital case, be told the truth about the effect… |
| 23-5417 | Ari Misha Liggett v. Colorado | Colorado | 2023-08-23 | Denied | Response RequestedResponse WaivedRelisted (2)IFP | constitutional-evidence criminal-procedure due-process exclusionary-rule harris-v-new-york impeachment-exception insanity-defense james-v-illinois supreme-court-precedent | Whether the Colorado Supreme Court's radical expansion of the narrow impeachment exception this Court adopted in Harris v. New York, 401 U.S. 222 (197… |
| 22-6018 | David L. Hering v. Patti Wachtendorf, Warden | Eighth Circuit | 2022-11-08 | Denied | Response WaivedIFP | adversarial-trial burden-of-proof criminal-defense due-process ineffective-assistance insanity-defense sixth-amendment | When using insanity as a tool in the defense of a criminal defendant who plead not guilty and is strongly asserting their innocence. Does defense coun… |
| 22-5383 | Lynn M. Giovanni v. New Jersey | New Jersey | 2022-08-18 | Denied | IFP | criminal-defense diminished-capacity guilty-plea ineffective-assistance insanity-defense psychiatric-evaluation sentencing sentencing-mitigation strickland-standard strickland-v-washington withdrawal | DOES THE ACTION/INACTION OF DEFENSE COUNSEL, IN FAILING TO UTILIZE OR UNDER-UTILIZING THE FAVORABLE PSYCHATRIC REPORTS COMPILED FOR THE DEFENSE IN ASS… |
| 21-7018 | Jose Fuentes v. Ricky D. Dixon, Secretary, Florida Department of Corrections, et al. | Eleventh Circuit | 2022-02-01 | Denied | IFP | character-evidence criminal-procedure deposition due-process ineffective-assistance ineffective-assistance-of-counsel insanity-defense medical-records subpoena trial-counsel witness-testimony | Question one of ground one of Fuentes £2254 petition: Relevancy is everything when it comes to evidence, and the Petitioner 's private psychologist, D… |
| 21-6492 | Jaime Galvez v. William Muniz, Warden | Ninth Circuit | 2021-12-02 | Denied | IFP | criminal-procedure defendant-rights directed-verdict due-process federal-law harmless-error insanity-defense right-to-remain-silent trial-court-error | 1. Is it clearly established federal law within the meaning of 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1) that a trial court's error, of forcing a criminal defendant to t… |
| 21-5572 | Kamau Alan Israel v. United States | Fifth Circuit | 2021-09-02 | Denied | Response WaivedIFP | competency competency-hearing ineffective-assistance ineffective-assistance-of-counsel insanity-defense mental-illness plea-bargain sentencing sentencing-guidelines strickland-standard strickland-v-washington | Trial counsel in this case failed to investigate Mr. Israel's mental illness before his case was adjudicated. But Mr. Israel has been mentally ill for… |
| 20-8038 | Shawn Grate v. Ohio | Ohio | 2021-05-14 | Denied | Relisted (2)IFP | capital-punishment criminal-defendant criminal-defense death-penalty due-process effective-assistance-of-counsel ineffective-assistance-of-counsel insanity-defense mental-health mitigation | 1. If a criminal defendant, charged with a death penalty-qualified offense, admit to murdering multiple women, and the only possible defense is a verd… |
| 20-6608 | Zachary Michael Patten v. Michigan | Michigan | 2020-12-11 | Denied | IFP | constitutional-rights criminal-procedure due-process habeas-corpus ineffective-assistance ineffective-assistance-of-counsel insanity-defense investigation medication mental-health search-and-seizure | I. Pettioner was denied his constititonal right to the effective assistance of counsel, where in spite of pettoners eftensive mentd health history and… |
| 20-5165 | Lonnie Kade Welsh v. Texas | Texas | 2020-07-24 | Denied | IFP | civil-commitment criminal-conviction criminal-procedure due-process fourteenth-amendment insanity-defense mens-rea mental-capacity sanity | 1. Would the State of Texas cause a fundamental miscarriage of justice violating the United States Fourteenth Amendment by refusing to overturn the cr… |
| 20-5164 | Lonnie Kade Welsh v. Texas | Texas | 2020-07-24 | Denied | IFP | civil-commitment criminal-procedure double-jeopardy due-process fourteenth-amendment insanity-defense mens-rea mental-capacity | 1. Would the State of Texas cause a fundamental miscarriage of justice violating the United States Fourteenth Amendment by refusing to overturn the cr… |
| 20-5163 | Lonnie Kade Welsh v. Texas | Texas | 2020-07-24 | Denied | IFP | actual-innocence civil-commitment criminal-procedure due-process fourteenth-amendment insanity-defense mens-rea mental-capacity | 1. Would the State of Texas cause a fundamental miscarriage of justice violating the United States Fourteenth Amendment by refusing to overturn the cr… |
| 19-8297 | Leif O'Connell v. Dushan Zatecky | Seventh Circuit | 2020-04-19 | Denied | Response WaivedIFP | appellate-counsel appellate-procedure constitutional-rights due-process effective-assistance-of-counsel ineffective-assistance insanity-defense plea-bargaining prosecutorial-misconduct sixth-amendment | (Issue added by the State Attorney General on Appeal not heard in post conviction court used to affirm appeal failing to address the claims below). Th… |
| 19-7870 | Louis Ivester Peets v. Robert W. Fox, Warden | Ninth Circuit | 2020-03-04 | Denied | IFP | actual-innocence certificate-of-appealability habeas-corpus insanity-defense ninth-circuit ninth-circuit-review not-guilty-by-reason-of-insanity procedural-bar schlup-gateway schlup-test | (1) If Petitioner provided sufficient newly presented evidence for all reasonable jurors to conclude that he was "not guilty by reason of insanity"—wo… |
| 19-5598 | Wade Hampton Bigelow, aka Ray Ford Gore v. United States | Fifth Circuit | 2019-08-15 | Denied | Response WaivedIFP | civil-rights competence-to-stand-trial competency constitutional-rights criminal-procedure discrimination due-process ineffective-assistance-of-counsel insanity-defense judicial-discretion mental-competency mental-health mental-health-records psychiatric-evaluation | 1. Whether the District Court Failed To Rule consistent with the Insanity Defense Reform Act (IDRA) (18 U.S.C. § 17) by failing to make a differentiat… |
| 19-5319 | William J. Barnes Jr. v. New York | New York | 2019-07-24 | Denied | IFP | appellate-review competency constitutional-rights due-process ineffective-assistance-of-counsel ineffective-counsel insanity-defense mental-capacity mental-competency structural-error trial-procedure | Did the county court deprive the petitioner of his due process and constitutional right to a full and fair impartial determination of his mental capac… |
| 19-5067 | Jimmie Darnell Dixon v. Darrel Vannoy, Warden | Fifth Circuit | 2019-07-05 | Denied | Response WaivedIFP | certificate-of-appealability constitutional-rights criminal-procedure criminal-procedure-insanity-defense-due-process-si due-process evidentiary-hearing ineffective-assistance ineffective-assistance-of-counsel insanity-defense insufficient-evidence | Whether the lower court erred denying COA on the claim of insufficient evidence where petitioner sufficiently proved by a preponderance of the evidenc… |
| 18-8715 | Quillie Merle Spray v. Kelly A. Ryan, Superintendent, State Correctional Institution at Shirley | First Circuit | 2019-04-05 | Denied | Response WaivedIFP | constitutional-law criminal-procedure effective-counsel fair-trial insanity-defense mental-evaluation sixth-amendment | Whether the Court of Appeals correctly decided an important question of constitutional law: that the Petitioner was denied his right to effective coun… |
| 18-6135 | James K. Kahler v. Kansas | Kansas | 2018-09-28 | Judgment Issued | Amici (12)Relisted (7)IFP | civil-rights constitutional-rights criminal-law due-process eighth-amendment fourteenth-amendment insanity-defense legal-history mens-rea mental-health | Do the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments permit a state to abolish the insanity defense? |
| 18-5763 | Jimmy Don Wooten v. Arkansas | Arkansas | 2018-08-24 | Denied | Response RequestedResponse WaivedRelisted (2)IFP | civil-procedure civil-rights constitutional-rights diligence-standard due-process insanity insanity-defense jurisdiction legal-diligence mental-capacity mental-handicap procedural-fairness standing | Did the Arkansas Supreme Court violate due process by denying mentally handicapped petitioner opportunity to litigate insanity at time of trial? |
| 18-5539 | Derek W. Pelto v. Julie L. Jones, Secretary, Florida Department of Corrections, et al. | Eleventh Circuit | 2018-08-10 | Denied | Response WaivedIFP | burden-of-proof change-of-law insanity-defense right-to-testify burden-of-proof certificate-of-appealability criminal-procedure ineffective-assistance insanity-defense right-to-counsel right-to-testify sixth-amendment | Whether the court of appeals improperly denied the Petitioner a certificate of appealability under 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c) on his claim that his counsel r… |
| 18-5172 | Samuel Isaac Marquez v. Timothy Filson, Warden, et al. | Ninth Circuit | 2018-07-09 | Denied | Response WaivedIFP | brumfield-precedent brumfield-v-cain due-process fact-finding federal-law habeas-corpus insanity-defense ninth-circuit state-court state-court-fact-finding | Whether the Ninth Circuit's decision contradicted Brumfield v. Cain by holding that a state-court determination of fact cannot be unreasonable due to … |