Fort Hood suspect may use insanity defense

He can enter his insanity plea but I don't think he'll get away with it. Remember he BOUGHT and brought his own weapons to the base. Now thats premeditated. If he was given guns from the armory and started shooting there it would have made an insanity plea a bit more believable. the cards are stacked against this man because of his actions and comments(before the shooting) not because of his beliefs which sadly tie in because of the final result.

A psychiatrist declaring himself insane? That'd be rich.

The insanity defense rarely succeeds anyways.

Just having a good,sincere and trusted friend to talk to is better than going to a shrink. No need for "psychobabble".

I am a health care provider (Oral Surgeon) and I always got the impression that psychiatrists are more psycho then the patients they r treating. And lawyers will be lawyers.......Just common sense should prevail. Gomer Pyle should be the judge.

old friend,

I'm unsure as to what your comparison with the Cambridge copper has to do with the topic. The Cambridge incident was due to ego's - and two of 'em at that. Here were dealing with an individual who lost the plot and started firing indiscriminatly at his co-workers....

What was your point again?

I wonder, if this guy had been some skin head or a "former" gang member, would your approach to this be any different? I bet not. Face it, this guy was not clinically insane, he went insane through the propaganda he was taught!

Obama made it easy for him to try and plead insanity when he commented on Hassan's case of Sudden Jihad Syndrome:

"We cannot fully know what leads a man to do such a thing."

Quite a contrast from Obama's clear and unambiguous denunciation of the innocent Cambridge cop, who has faced far more stress than Hassan ever did.

Oops, psychiatrist.

For the "insanity" plea to work, the defendant must not have been able to tell right from wrong at the time of the crime. That's gonna be a tough sell since the guy was an Army officer and a psychologist.

"So you don't believe he was an AQ sympathizer?"

I think he was a nutter. Perhaps he was a low-level AQ sympathizer, but to suggest this man was a member of AQ - or that his wanton, un-prepared act of violence has even 0.01% the hallmarks of a co-ordinated attack by trained terrorists wanting to inflict the maximum amount of dead people possible, is also sheer insanity on the part of the resident Islamophobes.

This situation could have been avoided had his superiors not been asleep at the wheel. Whether or not Hassan re-inserted into civillian life years ago would have made his karma better or worse - or indeed, left him to his own devices to truly become an AQ style agent of terror will forever remain speculation.

Nearly as insane as the nutters trying to paint this lass shooting as "jihad"." So you don't believe he was an AQ sympathizer?

Of course he's insane. Nearly as insane as the nutters trying to paint this lass shooting as "jihad". Surely somebody will Jack Ruby the major in his hospital bed.

It will sure save the taxpayer some coin, and some bandwidth at JT.

The insanity plea will probably work.

its so ironic.. a shrink, who is usually the one who would commit you to an asylum is insane himself... really odd

It might be insane, but I don't see that as a defense. Sane or not, he has proven himself to be a mortal danger to society. He should live out his life in a cell the rest of his days. Insanity should just be the difference between cells; padded or not.

Is Hasan still on full pay, I wonder?

Yes, that's standard.

Doesn't really matter. They have this guy banged to rights on evidence. Lots of witnesses, some really dodgy accomplices, and a public that is baying for his blood.

Indeed, they could skip the trial (save some taxpayers money) and just get to the penalty phase. This chap is going to die for his actions (and quite rightly so), and there is nothing that anybody can do to stop it from happening. His actions set in train a series of events that can only have one outcome.

He'd have to be insane not to. Bet this lawyer is making good money. Is Hasan still on full pay, I wonder?