Either Answer Is Safer
This trap appears as a wrong-answer choice in 1 active question. Spotting how it is built is the repair: read each example's “why it's attractive” before the “why it's wrong.”
Subject distribution
- Criminal Law1
Example wrong choices
14654_fellowship_trail · CRIMINAL_LAW · Choice AOnly if the jurisdiction follows the M'Naghten test for insanity.
Why it's attractive
M'Naghten is the famous insanity test, so students pick it from name recognition.
Why it's wrong
M'Naghten is a real insanity test, but it answers the cognitive wrongfulness branch; the stem gives knowledge of wrongfulness and inability to conform.
Spot it next time
Ask whether the fact is about knowing wrong or controlling conduct.
14654_fellowship_trail · CRIMINAL_LAW · Choice CIf the jurisdiction follows either the M'Naghten or the ALI Model Penal Code test for insanity.
Why it's attractive
It contains the correct ALI/MPC route and feels safer because it says either.
Why it's wrong
The answer expands the correct ALI/MPC route to include M'Naghten, but the M'Naghten half does not fit.
Spot it next time
For 'either' answers, require both named routes to fit the facts.
14654_fellowship_trail · CRIMINAL_LAW · Choice DEven if the jurisdiction has abolished the insanity defense, so long as the jury believes that the compulsion was irresistible.
Why it's attractive
It echoes the irresistible-compulsion fact and lets expert testimony do too much work.
Why it's wrong
The answer says the insanity defense is abolished but still lets the jury acquit based on the insanity fact.
Spot it next time
Expert testimony supplies facts; the jurisdiction supplies the defense.
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