Twinkie defense

The phrase "Twinkie defense" comes from Twinkies, a food product high in sugar.

"Twinkie defense" is a derisive label for an improbable legal defense. It is not a recognized legal defense in jurisprudence, but a catchall term coined by reporters during their coverage of the trial of defendant Dan White for the murders of San Francisco city supervisor Harvey Milk and mayor George Moscone. White's defense was that he suffered diminished capacity as a result of his depression. His change in diet from health food to Twinkies and other sugary food was said to be a symptom of depression. Contrary to common belief, White's attorneys did not argue that the Twinkies were the cause of White's actions. Rather they argued that his consumption of Twinkies was symptomatic of his underlying depression. White was convicted of voluntary manslaughter.

Origins

The expression derives from the 1979 trial of Dan White, a former San Francisco, California (U.S.) Police Officer and Firefighter who later became a city district Supervisor. On November 27, 1978, White assassinated Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk. At the trial, noted psychiatrist Martin Blinder testified that White had been depressed at the time of the crime, and pointed to several factors indicating White's depression: he had quit his job; he shunned his wife; and although normally clean-cut, he had become slovenly in appearance. Furthermore, White had previously been a fitness fanatic and health food advocate, but had begun consuming junk food and sugar-laden soft drinks like Coca-Cola. As an incidental note, Blinder mentioned theories that elements of diet could worsen existing mood swings.^[1] Another psychiatrist, George Solomon, testified that White had "exploded" and was "sort of on automatic pilot" at the time of the killings.^[2] The fact that White had killed Moscone and Milk was not challenged, but  — in part because of the testimony from Blinder and other psychiatrists  — the defense successfully convinced the jury that White's capacity for rational thought had been diminished; the jurors found White incapable of the premeditation required for a murder conviction, and instead convicted him of voluntary manslaughter. Public protests over the verdict led to the White Night Riots.

Diminished capacity

Twinkies were never mentioned in the courtroom during the White trial, nor did the defense ever claim that White was on a sugar rush and committed the murders as a result. However, one reporter's use of the term "Twinkie defense" caught on and stuck, leading to a persistent misunderstanding by the public that exists to this day, and was mentioned at the end of Milk, Gus Van Sant's 2008 biopic of Harvey Milk. In a bonus feature on the DVD version of The Times of Harvey Milk, a documentary on Milk's life and death, White's lawyers explain what they actually argued in court.

The actual legal defense that White's lawyers used was that his mental capacity had been diminished, and White's consumption of junk food was presented to the jury as one of many symptoms, not a cause, of White's depression.

In stories covering the trial, satirist Paul Krassner had played up the angle of the Twinkie,^[1] and he would later claim credit for coining the term "Twinkie defense".^[3] The day after the verdict, columnist Herb Caen wrote in the San Francisco Chronicle about the police support for White, himself a former policeman, and their "dislike of homosexuals" and mentioned "the Twinkie insanity defense" in passing.^[1] News stories published after the trial, however, frequently reported the defense arguments inaccurately, wrongly claiming that the defense had presented junk food as the cause of White's depression and/or diminished capacity, instead of having been symptomatic of (and perhaps having exacerbated) an existing depression.^[4]

As a result of negative publicity from the White case and others, the term diminished capacity was abolished in 1982 by Proposition 8 and the California legislature and was replaced by the term diminished actuality, referring not to the capacity to have a specific intent, but to whether the defendant actually had the required intent to commit the crime with which he or she was charged.^[5] Additionally, California's statutory definitions of premeditation and malice required for murder were eliminated by the state's legislature, with the return to common law definitions. By this time, the "Twinkie defense" had become such a common term that one lawmaker had waved a Twinkie in the air while making his point during a debate.^[1]

Supreme Court

During oral Supreme Court arguments in United States v. Gonzalez-Lopez (No. 05-352) in April 2006, Justice Antonin Scalia referred to the Twinkie defense in discussion of a defendant's right to counsel of choice: "[If I am a defendant,] I don't want a competent lawyer. I want a lawyer who's going to get me off. I want a lawyer who will invent the Twinkie Defense [...] I would not consider the Twinkie Defense an invention of a competent lawyer [...] but I want a lawyer who's going to win for me."^[6]

See also

• Gay panic defense
• The San Ysidro McDonald's massacre, blamed by the gunman's widow in part on monosodium glutamate in McDonald's food
• The Dead Kennedys' version of "I Fought the Law"
• Trial and Error, a 1997 film in which an attorney attempts to increase his client's blood sugar so that he may use the Twinkie defense
• Chewbacca Defense
• King Kong Defense
• The Matrix defense

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d} Pogash, Carol (2003-11-23). "Myth of the 'Twinkie defense'". San Francisco Chronicle. p. D-1. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/11/23/INGRE343501.DTL. Retrieved 2007-03-20. 
2. ^ San Francisco Chronicle, May 10, 1979
3. ^ Krassner, Paul (2006-08-01). "Ice Cream Treat for Pedophiles". Adult Video News. http://www.avnonline.com/index.php?Primary_Navigation=Editorial&Action=View_Article&Content_ID=273589. Retrieved 2007-02-28. 
4. ^ Snopes: The Twinkie Defense
5. ^ FindLaw for Legal Professionals - Case Law, Federal and State Resources, Forms, and Code
6. ^ United States v. Gonzalez-Lopez (4/18/06)

Further reading

• California Penal Code Section 25-29 from Findlaw
• Trial and Error by Paul Tatara for CNN on June 6, 1997. Retrieved March 20, 2006.
• Mauro, Tony (2006-04-19). "High Court Debates Defendants' Right to Counsel of Choice". Legal Times (Law.com). http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1145362818596. Retrieved 2007-02-02. 

External links

• Snopes: The Twinkie Defense
• "Myth of the 'Twinkie defense'" - San Francisco Chronicle, November 23, 2003