Will Nick Reiner's schizophrenia help him ‘escape'? How California insanity defense works

Nick Reiner, son of Rob Reiner and Michele Reiner, faces two courts of first-degree murder of his parents.

However, the 32-year-old has a long-documented history of schizophrenia, which has now become the focal point of his likely legal defense.

Nick was diagnosed with schizophrenia several years ago and was under psychiatric care.

Several weeks before the killings, his behaviour was notably “erratic and dangerous,” as reported by the sourced TMZ.

This alarming change coincided with doctors who changed his medication in an attempt to stabilize him.

However, with the adjustment, Nick had the opposite effect.

One source told, “Once the meds were changed, Nick was out of his head.”

In 2016, Nick told People Magazine openly about his struggle with mental illness and how he had been in and out of rehabilitation programs since age 15 and had experienced periods of homelessness.

Nick was arrested around 9:15 p.m. on Sunday, December 14, in the Exposition Park area, about 15 miles from his parents’ home.

Security footage shows him being confronted by police as he walked across a street and calmly putting his hands in the air.

If convicted, he faces life in person without parole or the death penalty.

However, his schizophrenic diagnosis can impact his trial significantly.

How does Insanity defense work?

In California, the insanity defense is governed by a specific legal test and involves a separate, two-part trial process.

It is not simply about legal standards focused on a person’s cognitive state at the exact moment the crime was committed.

In California, there’s a variation of the historic M’Naghten Rule. For a defendant to be found “not guilty by reason of insanity (NGRI)”, the defense must prove, by a preponderance of the evidence (more likely than not), that:

At the time of the defence, the defendant was laboring under a “defect of reason” or “disease of the mind.”

In case of the defect or disease, the defendant either:

• Wasn’t aware of the nature and quality of their act (e.g., didn’t understand they were killing a human being, perhaps due to a profound delusion) OR
• Wasn’t that what they were doing was morally or legally wrong

Additionally, the trial involving an insanity plea in California is typically bifurcated (split into two phases) i.e., the “Guilt Phase” and the “Sanity Phase.”

• Phase 1: It is a standard criminal trial where the jury decides only if the defendant committed the acts (the actus reus). In the guilty phase, mental state is largely irrelevant to the question of whether the act occurred. If the jury finds the defendant did the acts, they move to Phase 2.
• Phase 2: This is a second, separate trial referred to as the “Sanity Phase.” It focuses solely on the defendant’s mental state at the time a crime occurred. The same jury hears evidence from forensic psychiatrists for both the prosecution and defense.

The sole question remains: was the defendant legally sane or insane at the moment of the offense as defined by the M’Naghten Rule?

Will it help Nick escape punishment?

A common misconception is that an NGRI verdict means freedom. In California, it leads to a necessary commitment to a state psychiatric hospital.

• Commitment: The defendant is committed for an initial period equal to the maximum sentence they could have received if convicted. For a double homicide, this could mean a lifetime commitment.
• Release Process: Release will not be automatic. The release will solely depend on the recommendation of the hospital's medical director. A thorough court hearing will then be held. The defendant then has to prove that they are no longer dangerous to themselves or others and have regained sanity.
• Ongoing oversight: If released, they will remain under strict conditional release supervision, often for life, and will immediately be sent to hospital if their condition deteriorates.

For Nick Reiner, his schizophrenia diagnosis means his trial will be a grim battle over his state of mind, determining not if he will be confined, but where.