Editing Insanity defense (section)

===Australia===
In Australia there are nine [[Jurisdiction (area)|law units]], each of which may have different rules governing mental impairment defenses.<ref>{{cite web |title=Mental Impairment Defences |url=https://www.lrc.justice.wa.gov.au/_files//P97-ch05.pdf |website=Law Reform Commission of Western Australia |access-date=12 May 2021 |page=228 |date=2007}}</ref>

====South Australia====
In [[South Australia]], the Criminal Law Consolidation Act 1935 (SA) provides that:
269C—Mental competence

A person is mentally incompetent to commit an offence if, at the time of the conduct alleged to give rise to the offence, the person is suffering from a mental impairment and, in consequence of the mental impairment—
:(a) does not know the nature and quality of the conduct; or
:(b) does not know that the conduct is wrong; or
:(c) is unable to control the conduct.
269H — Mental unfitness to stand trial

A person is mentally unfit to stand trial on a charge of an offence if the person's mental processes are so disordered or impaired that the person is —
:(a) unable to understand, or to respond rationally to, the charge or the allegations on which the charge is based; or
:(b)  unable to exercise (or to give rational instructions about the exercise of) procedural rights (such as, for example, the right to challenge jurors); or
:(c)  unable to understand the nature of the proceedings, or to follow the evidence or the course of the proceedings.

====Victoria====
In [[Victoria (Australia)|Victoria]] the current defence of mental impairment was introduced in the ''Crimes (Mental Impairment and Unfitness to be Tried) Act'' 1997 which replaced the common law defence of insanity and indefinite detention at the governor's pleasure with the following:
:the accused was suffering from a mental impairment; and
:the mental impairment affected the accused so they either did not understand the nature and quality of the conduct, or did not know that it was wrong.<ref>{{cite Legislation AU|Vic|act|ciautbta1997472|Crimes (Mental Impairment and Unfitness to be Tried) Act|20}} Defence of mental impairment.</ref>
These requirements are almost identical to the M'Naghten Rules, substituting "mental impairment" for "disease of the mind".<ref name="M'Naghten's case"/><ref>{{cite BAILII |litigants=Bratty v Attorney-General for Northern Ireland |year=1961 |court=UKHL |num=3 |date=3 October 1961 |parallelcite=[1963] [[Appeal Cases Law Reports|AC]] 386 |courtname=auto}}.</ref>

====New South Wales====
In New South Wales, the defence has been renamed the 'Defence of Mental Illness' in Part 4 of the ''Mental Health (Forensic Provisions) Act 1990''.<ref>{{cite Legislation AU|NSW|act|mhpa1990355|Mental Health (Forensic Provisions) Act 1990}} Part 4.</ref> However, definitions of the defence are derived from M'Naghten's case and have not been codified. Whether a particular condition amounts to a disease of the mind is not a medical but a legal question to be decided in accordance with the ordinary rules of interpretation.<ref>{{cite AustLII|HCA|49|1990|litigants=R v Falconer |parallelcite=(1990) 171 [[Commonwealth Law Reports|CLR]] 30 |courtname=auto}}.</ref> This defence is an exception to the ''Woolmington v DPP'' (1935)  'golden thread',<ref>{{cite BAILII |litigants=Woolmington v DPP |year=1935 |court=UKHL |num=1 |parallelcite=[1935] [[Appeal Cases Law Reports|AC]] 462 |date= |courtname=auto}}.</ref> as the party raising the issue of the defence of mental illness bears the burden of proving this defence on the balance of probabilities.<ref name="R v Porter">{{cite AustLII|HCA|1|1933|litigants=R v Porter |parallelcite=[http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/HCA/1933/1.pdf (1933) 55 {{abbr|CLR|Commonwealth Law Reports}} 182] |courtname=auto}}.</ref> Generally, the defence will raise the issue of insanity. However, the prosecution can raise it in exceptional circumstances: ''R v Ayoub (1984).''<ref>''R v Ayoub'' (1984) 2 [[NSW Law Reports|NSWLR]] 511.</ref>

Australian cases have further qualified and explained the ''M'Naghten Rules''. The NSW Supreme Court has held there are two limbs to the ''M'Naghten Rules'', that the accused did not know what he was doing, or that the accused did not appreciate that what he was doing was morally wrong, in both cases the accused must be operating under a 'defect of reason, from a disease of the mind'.<ref>{{cite AustLII|NSWSC|789|2005|litigants=R v Jennings |date=11 August 2005 |pinoint=[26] |courtname=auto}}.</ref> The High Court in [http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/HCA/1933/1.html ''R v Porter''] stated that the condition of the accused's mind is relevant only at the time of the [[actus reus]].<ref name="R v Porter"/> In ''Woodbridge v The Queen'' the court stated that a symptom indicating a disease of the mind must be prone to recur and be the result of an underlying pathological infirmity.<ref>{{cite AustLII|NSWCCA|185|2010|litigants=Woodbridge v The Queen |parallelcite=(2010) 208 [[Australian Criminal Reports|A Crim R]] 503 at 531 |courtname=auto}}</ref> A 'defect of reason' is the inability to think rationally and pertains to incapacity to reason, rather than having unsound ideas or difficulty with such a task.<ref name="R v Porter"/> Examples of disease of the mind include Arteriosclerosis (considered so because the hardening of the arteries affects the mind.<ref>{{cite AustLII|NSWCCA|282|2000|litigants=R v Cheatham |courtname=auto}}.</ref>