## Facts

- Donald Lee McVey, a prison inmate, escaped from a state prison farm with a companion.
- They stole an automobile in Fort Madison, Iowa, and were later seen driving it in Urbandale.
- After a high-speed chase, law enforcement apprehended them.
- The State charged McVey with second-degree theft based on exercising control over a stolen motor vehicle under Iowa Code §§ 714.1(4), 714.2(2) (1983), and attempting to elude a pursuing law-enforcement vehicle under Iowa Code § 321.279.
- Before trial, McVey notified the State that he intended to assert diminished responsibility and offer a psychologist’s testimony on his mental capacity.
- The district court struck the diminished responsibility defense as unavailable for the charged crimes and excluded the psychologist’s testimony.
- McVey was convicted on both charges; the court of appeals affirmed.
- On further review, the Iowa Supreme Court limited review to whether diminished responsibility is available for theft under § 714.1(4).

## Issues

1. Whether diminished responsibility is available as a defense to theft under Iowa Code § 714.1(4) for exercising control over stolen property.
2. Whether diminished responsibility in Iowa applies only to specific-intent crimes, or can also apply to general-intent crimes that require proof of a mens rea element such as knowledge.

## Decision

- The Iowa Supreme Court affirmed the court of appeals and the district court.
- The court held diminished responsibility is not available for theft by exercising control over stolen property under Iowa Code § 714.1(4).
- The court treated § 714.1(4) theft as a general-intent offense; therefore, psychological evidence offered to negate intent was properly excluded.
- A dissent would have allowed mental-condition evidence when it bears on a statutory mens rea element, even for a general-intent offense.

## Legal Principles

- In Iowa, diminished responsibility permits mental-condition evidence only to negate a required specific-intent element of an offense.
- Diminished responsibility is not a defense to general-intent crimes; it does not operate as an independent excuse apart from the statutory insanity defense.
- Theft under Iowa Code § 714.1(4) (exercising control over stolen property while knowing or believing it is stolen, absent a purpose to promptly restore or deliver it) is complete without an intent to accomplish a further objective, and is therefore treated as general intent for diminished-responsibility purposes.
- Legislative limits on the use of mental disease or defect evidence inform the doctrine’s narrow application; courts should not extend diminished responsibility beyond negating specific intent.

## Conclusion

The Iowa Supreme Court held that diminished responsibility does not apply to theft by exercising control over stolen property under Iowa Code § 714.1(4) because the offense is general intent; accordingly, the trial court properly struck the defense and excluded expert psychological testimony offered to negate mens rea.


State v. McVey, 376 N.W.2d 585 (Iowa 1985)