Thursday 16 February 2012

Criminal responsibility assessment

         Rogers Criminal Responsibility Assessment Scales (R-CRAS).  The Rogers Criminal Responsibility Assessment Scales (R-CRAS; Rogers, 1984) was designed to quantify the elements of the so-called “ALI” criteria for criminal non-responsibility; however, Rogers also notes that it may be applicable to the M’Naughten standard as well (Rogers & Shuman, 2000).   Based upon a comprehensive evaluation, the examiner rates a series of scales grouped into five areas: (a) reliability of report; (b) organicity; (c) psychopathology; (d) cognitive control; and (e) behavioral control.  For example, the psychopathology section involves ratings of bizarre behavior, anxiety, amnesia, delusions, hallucinations, depressed or elevated mood, verbal coherence, and affective and thought disorder.  In addition, there are a series of more global ratings on final judgments of insanity and impairment.   Thus, the R-CRAS is an instrument that reflects the relative importance assigned by examiners to the first-order elements of an insanity-decision (e.g., the presence and relevance of psychopathology to MSO).   It should be noted that these elements are fairly abstract psychological and legal terms (e.g., “delusions at the time of alleged crime”) and do not necessarily represent the cues that are actually utilized by professional examiners in making their decisions.  This is a major issue of contention between Rogers, Melton et al. (1997), and Golding (1992) in the evaluation of this instrument.  Rogers believes it important to quantify the issue, although it would be unfair to assume that he does not recognize the value of more qualitative data (see Rogers & Ewing, 1992).  Melton and Golding agree that quantification is essentially illusory at this stage in the development of evaluations of criminal responsibility.  Both groups of authors agree, in large measure, on the domain of conceptual elements to be addressed.


Third Party Information
It is a commonly accepted professional standard of practice that forensic evaluators seek to examine the consistency of mental health history and other archival data, along with details of the crime scene and witnesses accounts of the defendant before, during, and after the alleged incident.  This “consistency” examination is relevant to issues of malingering and aids in supporting or challenging various psychological interpretations of the defendant’s mental state at the time of the offense.  The importance of this aspect of a forensic examination at the time of the offense has been discussed in numerous sources (see Golding 1992; Heilbrun, Rosenfeld, Warren, & Collins, 1994; Melton et al., 1997; Ogloff et al., 1993; Rogers, 1997; Rogers & Shuman, 2000).  Forensic evaluators need to pay close attention to crime scene data, as well as to more traditional sources of “third party” information (mental health and other records, witness statements and the like).  All such sources need to be integrated in as straightforward a manner as possible.  Where limited scientific data exist to support the inference (e.g., descriptive studies of the characteristics of hallucinations or delusions), they should be referenced, and where otherwise indicated, the evaluator’s logical link analysis should be declared and scrutinized.Neuropsychological and psychological testing can provide invaluable input into the assessment of criminal responsibility. Cases can range from trying a juvenile as an adult, to capacity to form intent, to assessing diminished capacity in a geriatric individual. For example, after a certain age a person without a major psychiatric illness is responsible for criminal actions. In younger teenagers, other factors in addition to age – such as those relating to intellect or other cognitive domains -- must be considered when evaluating criminal responsibility.





As Melton et al. (1997) note, the role of the forensic evaluator is not to “resolve conclusively all conflicting accounts about the case” (p. 50), but rather to conduct an evaluation that can  be scrutinized in terms of all available evidence, both psychological and behavioral.  Modern forensic standards of practice are to address the issue of the consistency of behavioral crime scene evidence with psycholegal formulations, and to allow the trier of fact of make the determination of their significance, guided by whatever scientific evidence can be directly or indirectly adduced.


Neuropsychological and psychological testing can provide invaluable input into the assessment of criminal responsibility. Cases can range from trying a juvenile as an adult, to capacity to form intent, to assessing diminished capacity in a geriatric individual. For example, after a certain age a person without a major psychiatric illness is responsible for criminal actions. In younger teenagers, other factors in addition to age – such as those relating to intellect or other cognitive domains -- must be considered when evaluating criminal responsibility.