CHAPTER 263

H.P. 1062 - L.D. 1517

An Act Amending the Laws Regarding Persons Not Criminally

Responsible by Reason of Insanity

Be it enacted by the People of the State of Maine as follows:

Sec. 1. 15 MRSA §103, as corrected by RR 1995, c. 2, §27 and amended by PL 2001, c. 354, §3 and PL 2003, c. 689, Pt. B, §7, is further amended to read:

§103. Commitment following acceptance of negotiated insanity

plea or following verdict or finding of insanity

When a respondent court accepts a negotiated plea of not criminally responsible by reason of insanity or when a defendant is found not criminally responsible by reason of mental disease or mental defect the insanity by jury verdict and or court finding, the judgment must so state. In that case those cases the court shall order the person committed to the custody of the Commissioner of Health and Human Services to be placed in an appropriate institution for the mentally ill or the mentally retarded for care and treatment. Upon placement in the appropriate institution and in the event of transfer from one institution to another of persons committed under this section, notice of the placement or transfer must be given by the commissioner to the committing court.

As used in this section, "not criminally responsible by reason of insanity" has the same meaning as in Title 17-A, section 39 and includes any comparable plea, finding or verdict in this State under former section 102; under a former version of Title 17-A, section 39; under former Title 17-A, section 58; or under former section 17-B, chapter 149 of the Revised Statutes of 1954.