Judge acquits man of sex assault charge because he was high on mushrooms

A man in British Columbia who admitted to an attempted rape was recently acquitted after a judge found he was too intoxicated on psilocybin mushrooms to be held criminally responsible.

Source: Wikimedia Commons

A man in British Columbia who admitted to an attempted rape was recently acquitted after a judge found he was too intoxicated on psilocybin mushrooms to be held criminally responsible—with the judge calling the case “unusual.”

Leon-Jamal Daniel Barrett admitted to attacking and sexually assaulting a woman before stabbing himself in the chest on March 18, 2019. And yet, he was still acquitted of all charges, with the court ruling he “acted involuntarily” after taking psilocybin mushrooms — thereby entering into a state of what a judge called “a non-mental disorder automatism.”

The alleged offence charges date back well more than half a decade.

Accordingly, along with calling the circumstances of his decision “unusual,” the judge also afforded time in the first entries of his decision to acknowledge that “the matter has taken an extremely long time.”

Timothy Hinkson—appointed as a judge of the Provincial Court of British Columbia in 2022—found the accused not guilty on the grounds of non-mental disorder automatism.

“Mr. Barrett will not face a conviction in this matter, but he will live with the knowledge that he made a choice that resulted in temporarily losing his mind and committing an appalling series of acts against a stranger,” Hinkson wrote in his decision.

“The scar that he bears will be a constant reminder of these actions,” Hinkson continued.

The ruling was handed down in Surrey Provincial Court in March and posted online earlier this month.

“This case is unusual,” Hinkson’s decision began.

“There is no doubt as to whether or not Mr. Barrett did what he is accused of,” said Hinkson.