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The Debate Between Psychiatry and the Law

The Forty-eighth Maudsley Lecture, delivered before the Royal College of Psychiatrists, 15 November 1974

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

Roger Ormrod*
Affiliation:
Royal Courts of Justice, London, WC2A 2LL

Extract

The reprinting by the Institute of Psychiatry, on its fiftieth anniversary, of Dr. Peter Scott's paper (1) describing Maudsley's work as a pioneer in criminology reminds us of the prominent part Maudsley played in the debate between psychiatrists and lawyers which has been in progress for nearly a century and a half, with, for much of that time, little satisfaction for either side. It is a classic example of the difficulties of inter-disciplinary communication. My only qualification to be the Maudsley Lecturer is that I happen to be doubly qualified in law and medicine, and, as Chairman of the Institute, a good deal closer to psychiatry than most lawyers. My qualities as an interpreter must therefore make good the intellectual deficiencies of which a glance at the list of my forty-seven distinguished predecessors makes me acutely conscious.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1975 

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References

1. Journal of Criminal Law, Criminology and Political Science (1956) 46, 753.Google Scholar
2. Bowen, LJ. In Edgington v. Fitzmaurice. (1885) 29 Ch. D. 459 at p. 483.Google Scholar
3. 1964 A.C. 698.Google Scholar
4. State Trials, Vol. 4 (New series), 847.Google Scholar
5. R. v. Dingwall (1867) 5 Irvine, 466.Google Scholar
6. Durham v. U.S. (1956) 94 App. D.C., 228.Google Scholar
7. A Treatise on Insanity and Other Disorders Affecting the Mind (1835) Reprinted in Hunter & Macalpine: Three-hundred Years of Psychiatry at pp. 839, 840.Google Scholar
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9. Soothill, (1974) Medicine, Science & Law, 14, 3, 189.Google Scholar
10. Law and Opinion, 2nd Ed. (Oxford), p. 34.Google Scholar
11. Power, M. J. et al. (1972) British Journal of Criminology, p. 111.Google Scholar
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