It is not surprising that the law tries to titrate the use of mental illness and the potential impact of these illnesses.

The system is based on the premises that most people are competent and responsible for their behavior. The significance of personality disorders in the legal system remains highly dependent on how personality disorders are viewed within the mental health community. To the extent personality disorders fall short of being defined as severe and independent disorders clinically, they will have less significance in the law. If the law has to decide to draw a line somewhere, why not look to clinicians Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical and see what illnesses Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical they view as most important and where they focus most of their clinical and research attention? Perceptions (eg, if personality disorders are not defined as “major” or “severe” mental illnesses, then they must be “minor” or “mild” problems) may carry more weight in the courtroom than clinically intended. There are primarily two personality disorders of interest in forensics: ASPD and Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD). Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical ASPD is of primary focus within the criminal forensic realm, whereas BPD is of considerable interest in the civil arena. ASPD tends to be excluded as a pertinent mental illness that qualifies as decreasing responsibility because it is a

disorder that is in general defined by “bad” or socially less tolerated or accepted behavior.30,32 BPD retains criminal legal interest when it crosses into symptoms of psychosis

and it is often identified as underlying, previously existing psychopathology in civil litigation. The combination Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical of ASPD/BPD has been found to represent a criminogenic blend of traits that is overrepresented in high-secure forensic samples.33 Both psychiatry and the law define behavior as either within or outside of the norm, and define behavior as acceptable or not. The law KRX-0401 in vitro defines certain Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical behaviors as crimes and certain actions as torts. Psychiatry defines certain behaviors and SB-3CT symptoms as abnormal or pathological, changeable or fixed, and treatable or not treatable. Both the law’s definition of mental illness and psychiatric definitions are often responsive to social pressures. Legal definitions of mental disorders are often quite vague across statutes and can at times be inconsistent with the psychiatric definitions.34 Usefulness in law does not necessarily mirror clinical conceptualizations or definitions.35 Statutory inclusion or exclusion of certain disorders can occur. The law has clarified (or claimed) its right to establish its own definitions of mental illness and by extension its own utility of the concept of personality disorder, as evidenced in the US Supreme Court decision for Kansas v. Hendricks36 and Kansas v. Crane.