iPost: Georgia and Virginia Executions Raise Concerns About Mental Disabilities

At DPIC link below

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/georgia-and-virginia-executions-raise-concerns-about-mental-disabilities

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iPost: Top-Ten Recent SSRN Downloads

At link below

http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/crimprof_blog/2010/09/top-ten-recent-ssrn-downloads-3.html

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Court Decisons: Nicholson v Branker (NC, 2010)

Just received a new decision (Nicholoson v Branker, 2010)where the evidence and experts were, with one exception, very consistent in agreeing that the client was ID/MR, and thus had his death penalty commuted to life.  Of interest is the mention and apparent implicit recognition of the Flynn effect on one of his WAIS-R scores.  A relatively clear cut decision that flowed from the evidence.

Technorati Tags: psychology, forensic psychology, forensic psychiatry, neuropsychology, intelligence, school psychology, psychometrics, educational psychology, IQ, IQ tests, IQ scores, adaptive behavior, adaptive functioning, intellectual disability, mental retardation, MR, ID, criminal psychology, criminal defense, criminal justice, ABA, Atkins cases, Atkins death penalty, American Bar Association, Atkins cases, death penalty, capital punishment, AAIDD, Atkins MR/ID listserv, ICDP blog, psychiatry, psychiatry and criminal justice, Flynn effect, Nicholson v Branker, Nicholson v NC

BOOKS: “Peculiar Institution: America’s Death Penalty in an Age of Abolition”

Book info at link below

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/books-%E2%80%9Cpeculiar-institution-america%E2%80%99s-death-penalty-age-abolition%E2%80%9D

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On the road again--blogging lite Sept 20 thru Oct 4

I will be on the road from Sept 20 thru Oct 4th.  I will be traveling abroad making a variety of professional presentations "down under"  (put some shrimp on the barbie for me)

I don't expect much time to blog...except for possible "push" type FYI posts re: content posted at other blogs.....or...mobile blogging (iPosts:  check out the link.....it is very cool...but, of course, I tend to be a tech nerd)......

I shall return.

Technorati Tags: psychology, IQs Corner, Intelligence, travel

iPost: Use and modification of the Mini-mental State Exam. In Mexican populations

Abstract and preview of article at link below

http://www.springerlink.com/content/h781truu790544ht/

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iPost: More on Webster possible SCOTUS review

More on Webster "petition of the day" at SCOTUS blog. ICDP blogged about the unbelievable twists and turns in this case in a previous post. Link below

http://www.atkinsmrdeathpenalty.com/2010/04/deadly-catch-22-it-is-possible-to.html

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iPost: SCOTUS Petition of the day - possible Atkins SCOTUS case

Petition of the day

SCOTUSblog

Today's first petition of the day is:

Title: Webster v. United States
Docket: 10-150
Issue(s): Whether a court of appeals has jurisdiction to review a federal prisoner's motion based on newly discovered evidence that the prisoner is mentally retarded and therefore constitutionally ineligible for execution, even if that evidence does not negate the prisoner's guilt.

Certiorari-Stage Documents

• Opinion below (5th Circuit)
• Petition for certiorari
• Amicus brief for Advocates for Human Rights

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iPost: The ABA Blawg 100

FYI link below

http://www.crimeandconsequences.com/crimblog/2010/09/the-aba-blawg-100.html

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"Confessing to Crime, but Innocent"

As noted in the article Many who do are people with MR/ID. Story at link below

http://sentencing.typepad.com/sentencing_law_and_policy/2010/09/confessing-to-crime-but-innocent.html

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iPost: Top-Ten Recent SSRN Downloads

See link below

http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/crimprof_blog/2010/09/top-ten-recent-ssrn-downloads-1.html

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iPost: Update on Holly Wood v VA

Final Holly Wood update.

http://justcrim.typepad.com/deathpenalty/2010/09/alabamas-machinery-of-death.html

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iPost: Douglas on Sentencing Defendants with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder

MR/ID and mental illness are recognized mitigating factors in criminal proceedings. Should more disorders be so classified? What about FAS. When does the "slippery slope" start and stop?

http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/crimprof_blog/2010/09/douglas-on-sentencing-defendants-with-fetal-alcohol-spectrum-disorder.html

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iPost: Recommended best practice on Flynn effect adjustment in Atkins cases

I will be integrating this into the next installment of the Flynn effect series at ICDP

Citation

Database: PsycARTICLES

[First Posting]

Looking to science rather than convention in adjusting iq scores when death is at issue.

Cunningham, Mark D.; Tassé, Marc J.

Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, Sep 6, 2010, No Pagination Specified. doi: 10.1037/a0020226

Abstract

1. The progressive obsolescence of IQ test norms and associated score inflation (i.e., the Flynn effect) may have literal life and death significance in capital mental retardation determinations (i.e., Atkins hearings). Hagan, Drogin, and Guilmette (2008) asserted that IQ score corrections for the Flynn effect were inconsistent with a "standard of practice" they deduced from custom, convention, and authority. More accurately, this reflected a proposed practice guideline or recommendation for practice, rather than a standard of practice. Whether a proposed guideline or recommendation for practice, these are better informed by an analysis of the available science than accepted convention. The authors reviewed research findings regarding the occurrence of the Flynn effect in the "zone of ambiguity" (IQ = 71–80), and proposed a best practice recommendation for discussing and reporting Flynn effect correction of IQ scores in capital mental retardation determinations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)

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iPost: Seeing the forest for the trees: Prevalence of low scores on the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children, fourth edition (WISC-IV).

Article info at link below:

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/apa-journals-pas/~3/VhXyYLY9LPI/650

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iPost: Mental Health Courts and Diversion Programs

Mental Health Courts and Diversion Programs

Psychology News from Elsevier

New special issue for the International Journal of Law and Psychiatry. Volume 33, Issue 4, Pages 201-278 (September-October 2010).

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iPost: KY judge expressing concerns about Kentucky's Atkins MR/ID capital procedures

Story at SENTENCING AND LAW blog link below.

http://sentencing.typepad.com/sentencing_law_and_policy/2010/09/state-judge-expressing-concerns-about-kentuckys-capital-procedures.html

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iPost: Nervous system traffic engineer

NeuropathLrng: Critical 'traffic engineer' of the nervous system identified http://t.co/4NdSDgF

Original Tweet: http://api.twitter.com/1/NeuropathLrng/status/23937515144

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iPost: Mentally challenged Virginia woman facing death

FYI. Story at Karen Franklins excellent blog -- link below. I have not studied the case

http://forensicpsychologist.blogspot.com/2010/09/mentally-challenged-virginia-woman.html

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Court Decision: White v KY (2010): Ake (indigent defense) Atkins-related decision

Just the other day I made an FYI iPost re: two recent policy papers addressing failures in the indigent criminal defense system.  This reminded me that the Kevin Foley, a regular contributor to the ICDP blog, had forwarded me a recent KY Supreme Court Atkins-related decision that relates to indigent defense rights.  In legal circles this is called an Ake issue, referring to the relevant SCOTUS decision.  In Ake v. Oklahoma, 470 U.S. 68, 76, 105 S. Ct. 1087, 84 L. Ed. 2d 53 (1985), SCOTUS held that the failure to provide an expert to an indigent defendant deprived him of a fair opportunity to present his defense and violated due  process.

The Karu White v KY (2010)  case case presents an interesting and important issue that is often seen in Atkins cases. An Ake issue concerns the state's obligation to provide expert assistance to an indigent  defendant. 

The trial court refused to provide White with funding for his own private expert (to determine his MR/ID status as per Atkins) and ruled that White could be assessed by a department of corrections psychologist.  White sued the trial judge in the KY Supreme Court in a writ of prohibition action, asking the Supreme Court to "prohibit" the trial judge from enforcing his order.  The KY Supreme Court said no, apparently concluding that White had not shown that a private expert is reasonably necessary for a full presentation of White's case.

But Ake involved an insanity defense situation, pre-conviction, as did one of the Kentucky cases cited by the court in White. It appears that some judges seem to think there is a lesser right involved if involved if the matter comes after the defendant has already been convicted. 

Technorati Tags: psychology, forensic psychology, forensic psychiatry, neuropsychology, intelligence, school psychology, psychometrics, educational psychology, IQ, IQ tests, IQ scores, adaptive behavior, adaptive functioning, intellectual disability, mental retardation, MR, ID, criminal psychology, criminal defense, criminal justice, ABA, Atkins cases, Atkins death penalty, American Bar Association, Atkins cases, death penalty, capital punishment, AAIDD, Atkins MR/ID listserv, ICDP blog, psychiatry, psychiatry and criminal justice, indigent defense, Ake issue, White v KY

ex parte Briseno (2004, TX) decision now posted. Adaptive behavior in TX Atkins cases

The Texas Briseno factors, which relate to the evaluation of the adaptive behavior prong in Texas MR/ID Atkins death penalty cases, is often mentioned in Texas Atkins cases (click here for all ICDP posts that may mention Briseno).  It was brought to my attention that a copy of the original decision was not available here at ICDP.  Thanks to Karen Salekin and on of her students that situation has now been rectified.  You can access ex parte Briseno (2004) now (and it is not listed in the Court Decisions blog roll).

Technorati Tags: psychology, forensic psychology, forensic psychiatry, neuropsychology, intelligence, school psychology, psychometrics, educational psychology, IQ, IQ tests, IQ scores, adaptive behavior, adaptive functioning, intellectual disability, mental retardation, MR, ID, criminal psychology, criminal defense, criminal justice, ABA, Atkins cases, Atkins death penalty, American Bar Association, Atkins cases, death penalty, capital punishment, AAIDD, Atkins MR/ID listserv, ICDP blog, psychiatry, psychiatry and criminal justice, Briseno standards, Texas and death penalty

Dr. Tedd Judd comments on Arbaleaz v Florida (2010) decision: Guest blog comment

Dr. Tedd Judd sent me the following comments re: the recent posting of the Arbaleaz v Florida case.  His comments were too long for the blog post comment feature.  His comments are reproduced "as is"

Dr. Judd states:

This case raises a host of issues. In this comment I would like to mention several and then discuss one, measuring adaptive behavior, in more depth.

1.       Should U.S. norms for IQ and/or adaptive behavior be used since that is the population they are being judged against and the context of the Atkins decision? Or should we use national norms from the nation of origin or some other subpopulation norms? Or national norms for childhood and U.S. norms for current?

2.       MR is not necessarily lifelong. Which time period is relevant? Childhood is relevant by definition. Time of the crime? Time of trial? Time of execution? (The reasoning behind various Atkins decisions suggests to me that all 4 of these time periods are pertinent, so perhaps Atkins evaluations should address all 4 distinctly.)

3.       Clinically measuring adaptive behavior in prison and using prison guards is problematic and prone to misinterpretation by the court but should not be entirely ruled out, since such behavior can be pertinent. Just by way of example, if a defendant earned a college degree while in prison it would not be intellectually honest to say that that was irrelevant.

4.       Potential bias in rating adaptive behavior (whether by self, family members, friends, teachers, prison guards, etc.) is problematic not only for Atkins but also when mitigation or access to services and disability accommodations and payments may be at stake. For this reason, validity scales in future versions of adaptive behavior scales would be useful. How to devise such scales is tricky, but I have some suggestions to offer here:

a.       Items that are very similar to one another could be included and compared for consistency of response, as is done in the PAI, BRIEF and others. This would address accuracy of comprehension, etc. but not systematic bias.

b.      Instead of presenting items in order of increasing difficulty by category, as the ABAS and Vineland do, they could be mixed, as in most personality inventories. Then a computer analysis may be able to discriminate if responses regarding the easy versus hard activities show consistency. I believe that a similar strategy is used in the VIP malingering test.

c.       The rating scale could be linked to a performance scale concerning selected items on the rating scale. For example, there might be an item, “Is able to read a telephone number of 10 digits and dial it accurately.” This ability could then be tested directly. A few such measures might be unobtrusive, such as filling out their name and address and other information on the rating form and following certain written directions on the form. Norms could be developed regarding how closely performance matches rating and significant deviations might suggest invalid ratings. While an individual might still malinger on both rating and performance, they might not do so consistently. Such a matching could potentially pick up both overly negative and overly positive rating sets and may be particularly useful with respect to the validity of informant ratings.

d.      With respect to cultural bias, peer comparisons might be used instead of more absolute ability norms. In other words, items might be constructed as follows: “Compared to others his/her age, his/her ability to ____________ is: Much better, somewhat better, about the same (or average), somewhat worse, much worse.” A similar approach has been used with the Informant Questionnaire on Cognitive Decline in the Elderly (IQCODE) in which the person rated is compared to themselves 10 years earlier on various everyday memory and executive abilities. The IQCODE has been found to be sensitive to dementia and insensitive to effects of culture and education.



Tedd Judd, PhD, ABPP-CN

Cross-Cultural Neuropsychologist

Technorati Tags: psychology, forensic psychology, forensic psychiatry, neuropsychology, intelligence, school psychology, psychometrics, educational psychology, IQ, IQ tests, IQ scores, adaptive behavior, adaptive functioning, intellectual disability, mental retardation, MR, ID, criminal psychology, criminal defense, criminal justice, ABA, Atkins cases, Atkins death penalty, American Bar Association, Atkins cases, death penalty, capital punishment, AAIDD, Atkins MR/ID listserv, ICDP blog, psychiatry, psychiatry and criminal justice, Arbeleaz v Florida, cultural issues, cultural sensitivity

iPost: Two notable new policy papers on the failings of indigent defense systems

Links to stories below

http://sentencing.typepad.com/sentencing_law_and_policy/2010/09/two-notable-new-policy-papers-on-the-failings-of-indigent-defense-systems.html

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iPost: How good are forensic evaluators in making Dusky- competence decisions?

Info on study from Law and Human Behavior at link below

http://www.springerlink.com/content/t34063x7j18h6114/

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iPost: Call for Papers: legal and ethical questions in neuroscience and robotics

Call for Papers: legal and ethical questions in neuroscience and robotics

Neuroethics & Law Blog

The Tilburg Institute for Law, Technology, and Society (TILT) is proud to announce the upcoming TILTing Perspectives 2011 conference entitled "Technologies on the stand: legal and ethical questions in neuroscience and robotics" The conference will be held at Tilburg University...

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iPost: Top-Ten Recent SSRN Downloads

http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/crimprof_blog/2010/09/top-ten-recent-ssrn-downloads.html

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iPost: The Law's Use of Brain Evidence

Info on article at link below

http://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-lawsocsci-102209-152948?ai=1k4&mi=3cwsz8&af=R

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iPost: Law and Cognitive Neuroscience

Info on article at link below

http://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.lawsocsci.093008.131523?ai=1k4&mi=3cwsz8&af=R

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iPost: Psychological Syndromes and Criminal Responsibility

And another at link below....

http://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-lawsocsci-102209-152857?ai=1k4&mi=3cwsz8&af=R

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iPost: Can and should we try to research sentencing law and policy in actual laboratories?

Story at link below

http://sentencing.typepad.com/sentencing_law_and_policy/2010/09/can-and-should-we-try-to-research-sentencing-law-and-policy-in-actual-laboratories.html

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Court Decision: Arbaleaz v Florida (2010)

I am attempting to catch up on cases that need to be posted.  Arbalaez v. Florida (2010) is now listed in the Court Decisions.

I have only skimmed the decision and see that it is fraught with some of the usual thorny issues of a defendant being born and raised in a different culture (Columbia), demonstrating considerable fluency in his first language, and the inappropriateness (as outlined by expert witness Dr. Tom Oakland) of assessing adaptive behavior in a prison environment.   Lots to chew on in this one.  Given my close personal and professional affiliation with Dr. Oakland (he is listed as an expert here at the ICDP blog and is a good friend) I refrain from additional commentary due to potential conflicts of interest.

Technorati Tags: psychology, forensic psychology, forensic psychiatry, neuropsychology, intelligence, school psychology, psychometrics, educational psychology, IQ, IQ tests, IQ scores, adaptive behavior, adaptive functioning, intellectual disability, mental retardation, MR, ID, criminal psychology, criminal defense, criminal justice, ABA, Atkins cases, Atkins death penalty, American Bar Association, Atkins cases, death penalty, capital punishment, AAIDD, Atkins MR/ID listserv, ICDP blog, psychiatry, psychiatry and criminal justice, Arbeleaz v Florida, cultural issues, cultural sensitivity

Petition for clemency in Atkins case: Holly Wood in Alabama

A petition for clemency has been organized for the Atkins case of Holly Wood in Alabama.  I am passing the link along without comment (as I have not read the particulars of the case).

Technorati Tags: psychology, forensic psychology, forensic psychiatry, neuropsychology, intelligence, school psychology, psychometrics, educational psychology, IQ, IQ tests, IQ scores, adaptive behavior, adaptive functioning, intellectual disability, mental retardation, MR, ID, criminal psychology, criminal defense, criminal justice, ABA, Atkins cases, Atkins death penalty, American Bar Association, Atkins cases, death penalty, capital punishment, AAIDD, Atkins MR/ID listserv, ICDP blog, psychiatry, psychiatry and criminal justice, Holly Wood v Alabama, petition for clemency, clemency

iPost: APAPsychiatric on DSM-5 status

APAPsychiatric: DSM-5: A Year in Review and the Year Ahead — Psychiatric News

http://fb.me/FUD4yHGz

Original Tweet: http://api.twitter.com/1/APAPsychiatric/status/22711382406

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iPost: Stinneford on Proportionality under the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause

Stinneford on Proportionality under the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause

CrimProf Blog

John F. Stinneford (University of Florida Levin College of Law) has posted Rethinking Proportionality under the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Although a century has passed since the Supreme Court started reviewing criminal punishments...

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