Polubinskaya, S.V. Uconscious behaviour in history of criminal law and judicial psychiatry in England. Review on the book by Joel Peter Eigen. Unconscious Crime. Mental Absence and Criminal Responsibility in Victorian London. The John Hopkins University Press. Baltimore and London. 2003.

Abstract: This is a review of a book by Professor of Sociology J.P. Eigen, which is devoted to a number of judicial proceedings, which took place in London in the middle of XIX century, and which concerned the crimes committed by the persons in the state of aberration. Their psychic condition did not fall into the criteria of diminished responsibility, as recognized by the English legal system of that time, and that is why such accused persons posed quite a problem for the courts, for example, if their acts were committed at the time of sleep-walking or a convulsive fit. The key sources for the author’s study were the judicial reports, known as Old Bailey Sessions Papers (OBSP), starting from the 1674, which have been published till the early XX century.