LaShaun Harris and Two Different Judgments

The prosecution of LaShaun Harris, a Black mother, exposes the difference between jury judgment and judicial judgment even more sharply.

In 2005, Harris threw her three sons—ages six, two, and one—into San Francisco Bay. She had been hospitalized repeatedly, treated with antipsychotic medication, and diagnosed with schizophrenia. She reported that voices from God commanded her to sacrifice her children.

California separated the determination of guilt from the determination of sanity. During the guilt phase, a jury found Harris guilty of three counts of second-degree murder. Harris then waived a jury for the sanity phase. A judge found her not guilty by reason of insanity and committed her to a state hospital.

A jury first determined that Harris committed the acts with the mental state required for second-degree murder. A judge then determined that she had proved she was legally insane when she committed them. The decisions addressed different legal questions, but together they demonstrate how the law can recognize criminal intent and legal insanity in the same profoundly psychotic woman.

Harris was not diagnosed with postpartum psychosis. Her case nevertheless reveals how the identity of the decision-maker and the legal question presented can affect the meaning assigned to severe mental illness.