Can Having Multiple Personalities Be Enough to Be Acquitted of a Crime ?

Is it so that insanity caused Billy Milligan to commit crimes he was not aware of?

The interesting story is that a man who had a mental illness due to abuse from a young age could commit a violent crime but not as himself but as part of 24 different personalities. Doctors have diagnosed this person who is known as Billy Milligan with a disorder which due to the nature of the illness, Billy becomes different people without recollection of the behavior of these various identities. You may be familiar with other high profile persons such as Sybil who also received treatment for dissociative identity disorder by her psychoanalyst. What is your opinion in these cases, is it possible for the mind to disassociate itself to the point that a person can have multiple identities apart from each other. In the case of William Stanley Milligan according to a quote from wikipedia "his lawyers pleaded insanity, claiming that two of his alternate personalities committed the crimes without Milligan's being aware of it. He was the first person diagnosed with multiple personality disorder to raise such a defense,and the first acquitted of a major crime." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Milligan) To explain further studies show that split personalities do exist in certain patients who have been treated for (DID). For instance dissociative identity is when a person has a mental condition of at least two personalities which control a persons conduct. The issue is that the person experiences memory loss as well as amnesia and it is due to this forgetfulness that those who are diagnosed with the symptoms of  depersonalization disorder have no re-collation of the prior events.  Pixabay Image

Leonardo DiCaprio Brings The Life of Billy Milligan to the Big Screen

The crowded room is a movie where Leonardo DiCapriotakes on the role of Billy Milligan and it is a role that the actor has waited a long time to portray.  Script writers are adapting the film based on a non-fiction novel written by Daniel Keyes called The Minds of Billy Milligan. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Keyes) In the book the author covers information about how Milligan grew up with a disfunctional environment, including the abuse that he endured during his youth. Later documentation is made of the distinct personalities that emerged from Billy during his treatment at various mental hospitals. To see more Books by Daniel Keyes online check out this page. I would say this story is one that many people are interested in knowing more about as well as potentially could be an Oscar winning film. Those involved in the project include script writers Jason Smilovic and Todd Katzberg. Some of the highlights will no doubt be on the very public trial which took place in Ohio, along with details of the events that happened at the Ohio State University Campus. There is also artwork and paintings that Milligan did during treatment at the Athens Lunatic Asylum which shows 7 of the 24 identities. One of the doctors who treated Billy name was David Caul, M.D. who is one of the founding members of International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation. Image Pixabay