What was the "Twinkie Defense"?

McGruff

The expression is derived from the 1979 trial of Dan White, a former San Francisco, California (U.S.) City Supervisor who fatally shot Mayor George Moscone and City Supervisor Harvey Milk on November 27, 1978. During the trial, a noted psychiatrist, Martin Blinder, testified that White had been depressed at the time of the crime, successfully arguing for a ruling of diminished capacity, and White was thus judged incapable of the premeditation required for a murder conviction; instead, White was convicted of voluntary manslaughter. As part of this testimony, Dr. Blinder cited White's uncharacteristic eating of Twinkies and drinking of Coca-Cola (White was well known as a fitness fanatic) as evidence of this depression — briefly mentioning that this may also have worsened the depression. The unpopularity of the eventual manslaughter verdict (a lighter sentence which set off the White Night riots) gave rise to the interpretation that White's lawyers had used depression caused by Twinkies as his primary defense. Contrary to popular belief, however, White's defense in fact argued that this consumption was unusual for him and reflected already existing mental instability; White would later commit suicide. In jurisprudence, a "Twinkie defense" is a criminal defendant's claim that some unusual factor entered into the causes or motives of the alleged crime. This biological defense is a so-called "innovative defense", through which defendants argue that they either should not be held criminally liable for actions which broke the law, or that the criminal liability should be mitigated to a lesser offense (e.g., from murder down to voluntary manslaughter), as they were suffering from the effects of allergies, stimulants (such as coffee and nicotine), sugar, and/or vitamins. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twinkie_defense Jul 27 06, 2:12 PM

Allergic2Life

Bingo! Jul 27 06, 2:56 PM