Infanticide: the worth of an infant under law

After Joanna le Vagh had been charged with the death of her daughter,] thejury de odio et atia in 1284 found that she had killed her in a frenzy while raving mad .... Edward I pardoned her at once on the strength of that verdict." Because the judge, prosecutor and defense attorney agreed that 19 year old Melissa Norris was insane in April 19761 when she beat her 3-month-old son to death while trying to exorcise "Satan", she was found not guilty by reason of insanity and will not go to prison. [Because the judge later ruled that Miss Norris now is sane, she also cannot be sent to a mental hospital. So she walked out ofthe ... courtroom free.' Although over seven hundred years separates the two infanticide prosecutions described above, the contemporary societies' attitudes toward this crime dictated identical outcomes-acquittal or pardon by reason oftemporary insanity.