Teaching "street law" to the criminally insane

A course in "Street Law" was taught to forensic patients by law students, following a format used by Georgetown University Law Center. Although the course has been taught to high school students and inmates of correctional facilities, this was the first time it has been extended to mental patients found not guilty of crimes by reason of insanity. An outstanding feature of the course was marked enthusiasm shown by patients who, through long institutionalization, had become apathetic, indifferent, and despairing. Their readiness and ability to learn brought to mind a couple of old sayings often heard around mental hospitals, "I may be crazy but I'm not stupid," and "Sometimes you can't tell the patients from the staff." The staff of at least one ward has picked up "teaching and learning to use as a central theme in treatment of patients, not abandoning traditional methods, but shifting the emphasis from therapy to teaching as a way of getting the patient's interest in his own rehabilitation. Judges, reviewing cases for release, have looked quizzical when the patients' active participation in a "law course" has been used as evidence of satisfactory progress.