In 1999, 11-year-old Patrick Boykin was accused of killing his 13-year-old sister. Boykin sobbed to investigators that the devil's voice kept telling him to kill her. Is he guilty of any crime and, if so, does he have any defenses?

What will be an ideal response?


ANSWER: Answers may vary: The crime charged would be murder and many different defenses could possibly apply. 1. insanity if Patrick did not know what he was doing was wrong or could not appreciate the criminality of his conduct; 2. irresistible impulse if there were no emotional brakes stopping his uncontrollable actions; 3. infancy in that there is a rebuttable presumption for children aged 8-14 that they have no mens rea, a presumption that can be overcome by a showing that Patrick appreciated the criminality of his conduct

Criminal Justice

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It was up until the late 1980s, with strong US Supreme Court cases, that the Bill of Rights was only given lip service and traditional police methods ruled the court systems

a. True b. False

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What is the first thing that the criminalist must do after visualizing a print but before making any further attempts at preserving it?

What will be an ideal response?

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A floater is a person who

A) Sees themselves as neutral in their attitudes toward a particular issue B) Chooses a substantive answer even when they do not know anything about the topic C) Seeks to ensure that a question has been filtered properly D) Chooses to answer only contingent questions

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The benefits of verbal deflectors are:

A) they are readily available to the lips B) they are nonjudgmental C) they can be said quickly D) all of the above

Criminal Justice