Legislative Highlight – special edition
January 15, 2019
Jenny Heilborn, contributor
For over four years, the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Virginia and various advocacy partners, including the disAbility Law Center of Virginia, have supported a bill to ban the execution of people with severe mental illness who are convicted of a capital offense. This year’s bill, SB 1137 was heard by the Senate Committee on Courts of Justice yesterday.
What is severe mental illness? Severe mental illness includes diagnoses that result in a severe impairment in major areas of functioning.
Advocates argue that if the role of the death penalty is retribution and to preserve morality, individuals with severe mental illness cannot understand the nature or consequences of their actions, nor can they exercise rational judgment to learn to abide by the law. This does not mean that individuals with severe mental illness would not be responsible for the crime they committed. Under this legislation individuals with severe mental illness could be found guilty and sentenced to life in prison, potentially without parole, but not to death.
The American Bar Association’s Death Penalty Due Process Review Project found that two-thirds of voters support a ban on executing people with serious mental illness.
The proposal considered by the Senate yesterday would add an exemption to the death penalty for individuals with severe mental illness.
We note that this is a sentencing bill, completely separate from the process by which individuals may be found Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity (NGRI) or mentally incompetent to stand trial.
On Monday, January 14, 2019, with a vote of 8 to 6, the Senate Courts of Justice Committee passed the bill forward to the full Senate for floor debate. Today, the full Senate approved the bill. It now goes to the House of Delegates for consideration. Follow Senate Bill 1137 to learn more or stay tuned with dLCV!
References:
Mangels, A.T. (n.d.) Death Penalty Due Process Review Project. American Bar Association. Retrieved from https://slideplayer.com/slide/11972857/.