Two Questions on a Legal Case of mental and/or medical abuse

[emilynghiem]

Mom on trial accused of killing 5-year-old with salt - Yahoo News

on this news story of a sick mother who killed her son by feeding him lethal doses of salt
I have two questions after reading the comments below the article

1. if the legal team BLOCKS any mention comparing symptoms of mental illness to Munchausen syndrome
(claiming it is too often seen as a MOTIVE in a criminal case, and not sympathized with as a mental illness)
can't the appeal team later go back and claim the OPPOSITE? that if the defense team PREVENTS and FAILS to mention this mental illness "in defense of the client" then that can be inadequate defense and get thrown out?

What's to stop this from being used later to void the proceedings?

2. someone brought up that Munchausen by proxy runs up hospital bills for
these sick parents who keep pushing for unnecessary surgeries or treatments for illness they cause themselves.

What's to stop hospitals from taking these cases
if govt is going to pay for it all anyway?

If insurance is going to pass the expense on to taxpayers,
where is the check on abuses of health care resources?

But if the family was held responsible,
or the insurance company had to pay for fraud and not pass it on to taxpayers,
wouldn't there be motivation to fix if these people are sick?

So the cost to the families or the insurance is minimal
instead of dumping it on the govt and taxpayers who have no direct contact with the situation to
control, question or check it.

 

[Michelle420]

I don't know the answer to your questions.

But I hope the mom is going to prison and not a nut house.

 

[emilynghiem]

I don't know the answer to your questions.

But I hope the mom is going to prison and not a nut house.

Both, the prisons for dangerous people should be treatment centers
for the mentally and criminally ill. They may still be detained for life,
but if they receive proper treatment for rehab and recovery,
they can work at restitution to pay their costs instead of punishing taxpayers
who didn't commit these crimes.

 

[nodoginnafight]

Not sure why the defense would insist on No Munchausen mentions.

 

[emilynghiem]

Not sure why the defense would insist on No Munchausen mentions.

It looks like they were arguing that instead of garnering sympathy for a mental illness defense,
this syndrome invites prejudice against the defendant by the prosecution arguing that it shows motive.
The sick person IS motivated to sicken the child for attention, so that biases the view toward criminal intent.
That is what I got from the article, that the prosecution would too easily abuse this to get a conviction.

[In a well publicized case in Houston, where the defense in a capital case
DID succeed in getting a life sentence for a man who shot a police officer to death,
the defense team showed the actual medical brain scans to show the "impaired functions and areas"
and convinced the jury that this person's brain was "physically impaired" where the damage was shown to be TANGIBLE.

With cases like Andrea Yates, it flip-flopped back and forth, going one way or the other,
where people are asked to guess if the person MENTALLY knew right from wrong which is INTANGIBLE.]