travel through a different type of land to get to the promise land in terms of his legislation. he s not going through democratic land, which has been very beneficial to him, he has to go through republican land and he s angered so many democrats in ways he s never seen before. do democrats realize that elections have consequences and whether or not they still realize they have as much power as they want? it s not there anymore. it s slowly dissipating. luke, thanks for coming into this happy friday, contessa. you too. there s a verdict right now in the elizabeth smart case. a federal jury has reached a verdict. they deliberated about 3 1/2 hours yesterday, went back at it for about an hour and a half maybe two hours today. the verdict is in. we re waiting to hear what this is. but this 57-year-old street preacher, brian david mitchell is charged with kidnapping and raping elizabeth smart, taking her from her utah home at knife point, holding her captive for nine months when
time his rapes of elizabeth so that she would get pregnant. that was at the point where elizabeth smart just took off from courtroom. it had to be incredibly emotional. paul callan is also on the phone with me. how much do you think it s been what? nine years since all of this unfolded. what takes so long in terms of the investigation, taking it to court, taking it to trial, why has it taken nine years for this finally to come to a sense of justice? well, this is an exceptionally long time period for a case to come to trial. but i mean, obviously, you know, it took a lengthy period of time to solve the case in the first incidence. and of course, when you have cases involving the insanity defense, there are the preliminary proceedings involve an assessment as the to whether the person, the defendants in the case, mitchell, is even competent to stand trial.
criminal justice system is that just because you are mentally ill does not mean that you have the benefit of the insanity defense. because, frankly, most people who commit crimes have some level of mental illness. and is that because you still have some capacity to tell right from wrong? that s exactly what it is. it s do you have the capacity to know the difference between right and wrong when you re committing the act? and that s what the prosecutors emphasized over and over throughout this trial. he may be he may have mental illness, but he knew exactly what he was doing when he raped this child and held her captive. his defense attorney robert steele says, paul, that it was mental illness and delusion that drove him to expose himself to an 8-year-old, to kidnap and rape elizabeth smart. he says because he has this delusion that he is above everybody else, that he is not subject to the laws of man, so to speak. and he loves to invoke god in
well rest in large part about how they feel about the varying opinions offered by experts about mitchell s level of mental health. those experts, forensic psychiatrists. now witnesses for the defense argued that mitchell is delusional, doesn t know right from wrong, that he felt compelled by god to kidnap elizabeth smart and to make her one of his wives. however, a witness for the prosecution argued that he about absolutely knows right from wrong. if he s found guilty by reason of insanity, he ll go to a mental hospital. if he s found guilty, he ll spend a long time behind bars. a fashion designer s body in a bathtub in a swanky new york hotel. and now the question, what happened? barbara walters gives sarah palin another crack at the question. well, let me try this. would you like to tell us what
is some possibility of some severe psychological issues. however, the argument is is the psychological problems that he has, does that rise to the point of delusional behavior, paranoid skichizophrenia where could be found not guilty as reason by insanity. but as the prosecuting attorney has said over and over again, this man is a chameleon and adapting this behavior in order to feign mental illness. when we look at the issue of legal insanity, this is what s being deliberated at this time. elizabeth smart was only 14 years old when she went through this incredible, long ordeal. now she s 23. she has taken a break because of the court trial from a religious mission she s been serving in paris for the church of jesus christ of latter-day saints. what s the religious impact of her having to relive this on the stand in front of her parents? i think this is with the