Blake v. United States
United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
407 F.2d 908 (1969)
Blake (defendant) had a decades-long history of severe psychiatric illness, hospitalizations, electroshock treatment, and heavy substance use. After drinking heavily and telling a waitress he would return with money, he robbed a bank he had a long-standing grudge against. At trial, he raised an insanity defense, and the judge instructed the jury using the older Davis standard requiring the defendant to be so deranged as to be incapable of distinguishing right from wrong or unable to control his actions at all. Blake had asked the judge to instead use the newer Model Penal Code test. He was convicted and appealed the instruction.
Whether a person is criminally responsible for conduct if, at the time of the conduct, a mental disease or defect left him lacking substantial capacity either to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirements of law.