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warshawlawScott: Yeah but...he did know it was wrong when he did it. The insanity defense is based on either irresistable impulse (i.e., a schizo being told by God to act) or lack of understanding due to mental disease so severe that he doesn't understand what he did was wrong.
Gilbert: I happen to think you are correct about the pedophilia registration laws amounting to an unlawful additional criminal sanction. The courts that have addressed it so far have fudged the matter by stating that absent incarceration and/or fines, the law isn't an impermissble ex post facto (after the fact) criminal penalty but merely a civil or administrative requirement. Sort of like the now famous fudging on torture: If I kick you in the nuts, it is torture but if I bitch-slap you and chain you to a door for four hours in an uncomfortable position it isn't. Personally, I'd like to see the jackasses responsible for Abu Ghraib chained to a door, etc., and see whether they think it is torture then...
Jackson knew what he was doing, so he was not insane, and in the baseball context, the sanctions are all "criminal" hence my view he should not be hung out to dry for something that wasn't even in existence when he was punished the first time.