Download The Brain Defense: Murder in Manhattan and the Dawn of Neuroscience in America's Courtrooms AudioBook Free
Called "the best kind of nonfiction" by Michael Connelly, this riveting new booklet combines true crime, brain technology, and courtroom theatre. In 1991 the police were called to East 72nd St. in Manhattan, in which a woman's body acquired fallen from a 12th-story screen. The woman's hubby, Herbert Weinstein, soon confessed to having struck and strangled his wife after a disagreement, then falling her body out with their apartment screen to make it appear to be a suicide. The 65-year-old Weinstein, a quiet, unassuming retired advertising exec, had no criminal history, no history of violent action - not even a short temper. How, then, to make clear this horrific action? Journalist Kevin Davis uses the perplexing story of the Weinstein murder to provide a riveting, deeply investigated exploration of the intersection of neuroscience and unlawful justice. Shortly after Weinstein was imprisoned, an MRI revealed a cyst how big is an orange on his brain's frontal lobe, the part of the brain that governs wisdom and impulse control. Weinstein's lawyer seized on that breakthrough, arguing that the cyst acquired impaired Weinstein's wisdom and that he should not be held criminally in charge of the murder. It had been the first case in america in which a judge allowed a scan exhibiting a defendant's brain activity to be accepted as evidence to aid a promise of innocence. The Weinstein case marked the dawn of a fresh era in America's courtrooms, bringing up complex and often troubling questions about how we establish responsibility and free will, how exactly we view the goal of punishment, and how strongly we are prepared to bring scientific facts to tolerate on moral questions. Davis brings to light not only the intricacies of the Weinstein case but also the broader history linking brain accidental injuries and aberrant action, from the bizarre reviews of Phineas Gage and Charles Whitman, perpetrator of the 1966 Texas Tower massacre, to the role that brain damage may play in violence completed by basketball players and troubled veterans of America's 21st century wars. The Weinstein case opened the door for a novel defense that continues to change the legal system: Unlawful lawyers are more and more embracing neuroscience and adding the effects of brain accidental injuries - whether caused by stress or by tumors, malignancy, or medicine or alcohol mistreatment - and arguing that such damage should be considered in determining guilt or innocence, the loss of life charges or years behind bars. As he needs stock of days gone by, present and future of neuroscience in the courts, Davis offers a robust profile of its potential and its hazards. Thought-provoking and brilliantly built, The Brain Security marries a murder unknown complete with colorful characters and courtroom theatre with a complex talk of how our legal system has evolved - and must continue steadily to change - even as broaden our understanding of the human brain.
