Defence Lawyers using defence of ASD for offenders that commit serious crime.

Not just the mainstream media but also social media stuff too like crime hunting groups who post videos on youtube seem to luke showing people with disabilities who have done some terrible things but they like to victimised whole groups of people for the actions  of the few 

I think a lot of BMW drivers need to know they're not in a class of their own! It used to be Volvo drivers who were bad mannered drivers, now its more remarkable to see a well mannered one.

Same here, it's something I've struggled with, think there may be grey areas!

The press seem to use all sorts of generalisations to wind people up, since this thread started I saw a news article "driver of BMW kills pedestrian" like all BMW drivers are somehow a category of their own!

Can't help but think it's all part of a strategy employed to sensationalise things, all lined up  to someone's agenda.

Theres no excuse for any crime that said we need to be a le to identify peoples needs not only to help them but to help others and avoid issues 

Yes some people with asd may have a younger mind but also have urges which leads to an offense but A they still did wrong and B using asd as a defense tarnisheseveryone 

TheCatWoman said:

Given that the rates of prosecution, let alone conviction of any sexual offence is so low in this country and police so unwilling to take any notice of sexual offences in general, I doubt that the sort of case you're describing would make it to court. The CPS have to take publc interrest into account before taking a case to court, I doubt if this sort of case would meet the already high bar.

But the example I gave was real. I pulled it off a lawyer’s website. See the thing is the reason most sex crimes don't get prosecuted is lack of evidence of the fact. Either you can't prove the sexual activity happened or you can't prove there wasn't consent. When the autistic person realises, they were mistaken about consent after the fact (usually because someone says stop) they will admit this. And as far as the police are concerned that's a confession. The police tend to forget it's not enough to prove there wasn't consent you must prove the other party knew that (or reasonably should have known that).

So the 2 big hurdles the prosecution have, proving the act and proving the lack of consent, are cleared by the defendants own testimony. They see it as a slam dunk open and shut case and forget about the 3rd hurdle of proving a lack of belief in consent. ... because they tend to assume that's obvious when in fact it definitely isn't.

Also they tend to assume if autism is raised as a defence it will be as a form of insanity defence and government guidelines specifically tell them to prosecute even if they think there is an insanity defence. However as previously mentioned the autism is usually more relevant to the mens rea (mental component) of the crime which is different.

Really no ... the guy was an idiot. The only really smart thing he did was use a hacked intermediate computer to try and hide his tracks and that's what got him caught. MI5 had already compromised the computer he was using because a load of (much better, more malicious) hackers were using it. Most of those hackers were hacking banks or big companies but the companies droped those charges. And US / MI5 wanted to make an example of someone.

Literally all he did was write a program to try the default password / admin acount name on a load of computers at the pentagon because he noticed they never changed them and they were all the same.

I expect some of the good hackers they caught did end up getting hired, by big companies maybe, but McKinnon was a noob not worth hiring. So they chose him to make an example out of.

I think the Pentagon would of been better off employing him to conduct safety tests on their systems than prosecuting him. But then the US [in]justice system routinely goes for the most vulnerable and easiest targets possible, they seem to have no compassion or understanding for people like McKinnon and they try children as adults for serious crimes. It all seems very medieval and assumes that everybody knows absolute rights from wrongs with no grey areas.

I agree, my ASD has manifested as an incredibly strong sense of morality though I've moderated it by introducing a concept of whether an immoral (wrong) act justifies guilt or punishment based on the intent (generally judged by non-maleficence standards). A simplistic example being that killing is morally wrong, but no one should punish a soldier for acting to protect others.


With that said, the way that ASD is used in court varies greatly and I think a lot gets lost in the media reports but I do share the concern that by trying to use it as a defence can alienate people, particularly when it's done without context about how that particular person manifests their symptoms.

Thank you all for your replies, I get that this is a very emotive subject, as I am only recently diagnosed, I've always saw things as BLACK & WHITE, no middle ground and I am trying to see other viewpoints and it's extremely difficult for me.

In saying that, I do wish the media would stop saying things "He/She is autistic and so on". I fear this could lead to people fearing that they are autistic and afraid to tell others that they are for fear of being judged because of the few that commit deplorable acts.

As I said earlier the young man had a whole range of learning disabilities and I used this as an example of the complexities.

Given that the rates of prosecution, let alone conviction of any sexual offence is so low in this country and police so unwilling to take any notice of sexual offences in general, I doubt that the sort of case you're describing would make it to court. The CPS have to take publc interrest into account before taking a case to court, I doubt if this sort of case would meet the already high bar. But I do take your point, that if such a case did come to court a defence lawyer would be duty bound to ask that his clients ASC and any other learning difficulty be taken into account.

With the general paranoia around people with mental health problems commiting violent crimes of course media are going to pick it up and run with it, they're in the business of selling content, sometimes, the good ones will ask how some one can be so failed by the services who are supposed to care for and treat them. The same things get said over and over again, lessons will be learned, but somehow they never are, its like our medical, educational and justice systems have a learning difficulty!

I'm not sure how to feel about it. I think it's human nature for reporters and their readers / viewers to immediately look for - and latch onto - anything in the way of known differences that could potentially help to explain instances of shocking and abhorrent behaviour. So perhaps it's inevitable, because we'll never know the reason behind any given individual's motivation or behaviour until the case has been fully investigated (and sometimes not even then).

I'm not sure that the media are necessarily aiming for autism to be seen as an "excuse" or sole reason - perhaps it's more a case of them flagging one potential contributory or related factor.

That being said, many of us on the spectrum have comorbid mental health issues, and research has shown that we can be at greater risk of suicidal thoughts or actions. Is it so far fetched to think that certain conditions, such autism (including its traits like rigidity, black and white thinking, and the potential for losing control of our behaviour during meltdowns, for example) in combination with mental health issues, could also lead to extreme actions at the other end of the behavioural spectrum?

We can also be more naive than neurotypicals, which can make us more susceptible to being groomed and manipulated into doing things that we shouldn't.

This article is interesting. Whilst it suggests that some research points to autistic people being more likely to be victims rather than perpetrators of crimes, it also says this:

"On the other hand, some studies indicate that individuals with autism may have a higher propensity for certain types of offenses, such as arson (Hare, Gould, Mills et al., 1999; Mouridsen, Rich, Isager et al., 2008), sex offenses (Cheely et al., 2012; Kumagami & Matsuura, 2009), and assault and robbery (Cheely et al., 2012)."

From: https://i-am-autism.org.uk/autism-and-crime-is-there-a-dangerous-connection/

Just for info, there's a similar recent thread here (one of many, I know).

So, overall, I don't really know what to think or feel about it.

I think the situation you describe is more intellectual disability than autism though. The kind of case I'm thinking about might be a case I'm thinking of where a young man with Aspergers was having a chat with a woman on a bus. The chat gets a bit flirty, and he thinks 'ok she's really into me' she he puts his hand on her knee. She reacts angrily and he immediately removes his hand. But because we now live in the age of political correctness the police get involved. He's charged with sexual assault. And this poor man’s lawyer has to explain to a jury that sexual assault requires than his client not reasonably believe the other party consented, and when they decide what he reasonably believed they have to take his Aspergers and the difficulty it causes him navigating flirting into account.

I've had a look about and I can find no reference to such a case. That doesn't mean it didn't exist. It might have been in a lower court or under seal. The only thing similar I can find is the Hensman v Ministry Of Defence case. What was a discrimination trial. A guy with Aspergers had been caught filming a shower secretly at work and was sacked from his job. There was a discrimination claim. The nature of the equality act is such that even if a disabled person commits a crime at work you don't automatically get the right to sack them if their disability was involved in the crime.

But even here all the court said was, yes having Aspergers could potentially mean sacking him for recording people naked in the shower is discrimination. But this needs to go back to the tribunal so they can balance that against the need to maintain secrecy on a secret military base.

Also, even that verdict is really weird because The Equality Act 2010 (Disability) Regulations 2010 exclude voyeurism as a special case where the equality act doesn't apply.

I always thought about that Gary McKinnon case and whether it was a fair defence to use autism as the reason he didn't see any harm in what he did and therefore shouldn't be locked up. (Hacking to find out if there are aliens )

I'm really not sure, while theres obvious moral code and distinction between right and wrong, i certainly find some laws and rules arbitrary, ones that don't cause harm mainly or are very many made in their origin (like double yellow lines on roads!) but still follow them as although they may seem questionable,  they are what keeps some form of order in society.

I remember a collegue had a counselling client who had autism amoung many other learning difficulties and he couldn't get his head around consent, he couldn't understand that being friends with a woman didn't mean that they had to have sex with him. I think partly this was due to his limited understanding and cognitive functioning, he needed to have sex and relationships explained to him in the same terms as a child, but he had needs and desires and body of an adult man, a large adult man.

I think part of the problem with sex eduacation for people with disabiities, both mental and physical is that those who are supposed to help us infantalise us instead, they don't really want to explain things, they're embarassed. When everything is reduced to the lowest common denominator and so many of the peole who work with disabled people are poorly trained how can they be expected to cope with explaining to someone with the understanding of an eight year old in an adult body the complexities of negotitating sex and relationships? I suspect its worse now and that far to many people are getting their sex and relationship education from social media and the likes of Andrew Tate.

Of course sexual predators are notoriously manipulative and I wonder how easy it is to convince people that you don't understand, when you do and just don't care? The criminal justice system is overwhelmed, especially with rape and sexual abuse cases and what do you do with those convicted, if they're convicted and given any meaningful sentance?

No one with any intelligence will think everyone with ASD is a killer.

This issue comes up again and again on here.

Autistic people are widespread throughout society now and everyone knows someone who is autistic.

Have you considered the killers might have ASD?

Autistic people will advance through society by telling the truth.  Not by lying, when it suits us.

Well frankly ASD won't usually amount to an insanity defence. Insanity defence usually has 2 types:

• Person is hallucinating
• Person is delusional

Where ASD applies is intent and state of mind. Lots of crimes have very specific state of mind tests. Consider sex crimes. Lots of sex crimes have as a condition that the perpetrator must have not reasonably believed the other party consented. Clearly what an autistic person might reasonably believe, based on social cues and nonverbal communication, will be different from a neurotypical.

That said you don't get to complain that a defendant is autistic, and that the press report that, or that they are black, or gay, or young or old etc. Yes, people will draw unjustified inferences but so long as the journalists aren't you can't complain too much.

The Southport stabber was a whovian. If he'd been a GTA fan or had a big porn collection they would have blamed that but apparently being a Dr WHO fan isn't a red flag to the media. It's no more rational to link the stabbing to autism than to GTA or porn or Dr Who. But human beings love jumping to conclusions. But that doesn't mean we can ban them reporting he is a whovian etc.

Its the fact the media say it straight away like they did with the Stockport incident, male was caught and charged amd immediately it was reported he was ASD.

That is what annoys me, here in Scotland, a guy who was found guilty of voyeurism over a 10 year period had the defence of autism, sorry, no, he is a sexual predator regardless if he is autistic or not

I too agree, most of us know the difference between right and wrong, the only thing I can think of where ASC could be part of a defence is if as part of that same defence, the defendant say's they've been groomed by others.

I agree. The knowledge that a defendant is autistic may be relevant to the case and may be something that should be made known to the jury, but it is not something that the general public needs to know as it ends up reinforcing negative stereotypes, especially when they make the statement in isolation without any clarifying data, such as why it is relevant to the case