On November 10, 1978, Daniel James White resigned from his position as a supervisor for the city and county of San Francisco. Several days later he changed his mind and asked to be reinstated. Mayor George Moscone allegedly assured White that he would be reinstated, but later denied making any such assurances. Supervisor Harvey Milk opposed White's reappointment as well.

A press conference was scheduled by the mayor on November 27th to announce the new supervisor. The day before the press conference a reporter phoned White and informed him that he was not going to be reinstated. The morning of the press conference, White had an aide pick him up from his home and drive him to city hall. However, instead of entering the building at the main entrance, which had a metal detector, White walked around to the side of the building and entered through a basement window. He proceeded to the mayor's office and asked the secretary if he could see the mayor. A few minutes after White was admitted to the mayor's office, the secretary heard the sound of his raised voice and then several dull thuds.

White then exited the office and ran to the area of the building housing the supervisors' offices and used his key to enter. He requested a meeting with Supervisor Milk. Approximately 15 seconds after they entered Milk's office, shots were again heard. White then demanded the car keys from the aide and ran out.

White called his wife and met her at a cathedral. Together they walked to a police station where he surrendered himself. The police removed a gun from a holster on White's right hip. After being read his rights, White gave a statement to the police in which he confessed to the shootings.

An autopsy showed that Mayor Moscone had been shot four times, twice in the body and twice in the head. The shots to his head were made after he was lying on the floor and were fired from a distance of one foot. Supervisor Milk's autopsy revealed that he had been shot five times. As with the mayor, the shots to the head were delivered after he was lying on the floor. The bullets recovered from both bodies were fired from the gun confiscated from White.

In his statement to the police immediately following the murders, White stated that he had been under financial, political, and personal pressure. He went to city hall the morning of the murders to ask the mayor about his reappointment. Before leaving his house, he armed himself with his gun. When the mayor told him he would not be reappointed, he got fuzzy and heard a roaring in his ears. He thought about the mayor lying to him, the effect it would have on his family, and the lies that would be told about his performance as supervisor, and then he shot Moscone. White then reloaded his gun and left the mayor's office. He then decided to go talk to Supervisor Milk, who had worked against him. When they met, Milk smirked at him. He then felt flushed and shot Milk as well.

At Daniel White's trial, the defense presented a diminished capacity defense. This defense contends that although the defendant was not insane, due to emotional distress, physical condition, or other factors he or she could not fully comprehend the nature of his or her criminal acts, particularly murder or attempted murder. However, White's particular defense has been dubbed the "Twinkie defense" and has become a common term in legal studies. The Twinkle defense is defined as a claim by a criminal defendant that he or she was suffering from diminished mental capacity due to the intake of too much sugar. At the close of the trial, the jury found Daniel White guilty of two counts of voluntary manslaughter rather than murder. He was sentenced to less than 8 years in prison.

The verdict spawned a protest among the gay community, of which Supervisor Milk was a part. Known as the White Night riot, protesters set fire to police cars and stormed city hall. Later, a more peaceful candlelight march was held.

In the aftermath of the verdict, most reports focused on the so-called Twinkle defense, in which the defense argued that the refined sugar in junk food had made White depressed and mentally incapable of premeditated murder, and that White's habit of feasting on junk food had left him with a diminished capacity for reason.

With so much media coverage, the story continued to be spread. The public perception was that Daniel White's continuous consumption of Twinkles and other junk food raised his sugar level so high that he could not control himself and therefore was not responsible for the murders he committed. Phrases such as, "eat a Twinkie, commit a murder" were not unheard of. However, was this really the defense that was offered for Daniel White, or is it an urban legend resulting from media hype?

To support the diminished mental capacity defense, White's attorneys presented opinions from four psychiatrists and one psychologist. All five expert witnesses testified that White was suffering from depression and lacked the mental capacity to deliberate and premeditate a murder.

The prosecution also presented expert witness testimony. The psychiatrist for the prosecution had examined White on the evening of the shooting. He found him to be moderately depressed but without signs of clinical depression. His conclusion was that White had the capacity to deliberate and premeditate murder.

So where do the Twinkles fit in? Martin Blinder, one of the psychiatrists for the defense, was on the stand for a whole day providing his evaluation of White. During this day-long process he told the jury that in the days leading up to the killings White had changed his normal hygiene and work habits and had given up his healthy diet and indulged in junk food, including Twinkles and Coke. All of these activities were symptoms of his depression. The junk food made White even more depressed, which caused him to binge more.

Chief defense attorney Douglas Schmidt's closing argument, which was 24 pages long, only briefly mentioned the consumption of junk food. "Whether or not ingestion of food stuffed with preservatives and sugar in high content causes you to alter your personality somehow, or causes you to act in an aggressive manner, I don't know. I'm not going to suggest to you for a minute that that occurs. But there is a minority opinion in psychiatric fields that there is some connection."

The real diminished mental capacity defense of Daniel White was based on his depression, which allegedly caused an inability to premeditate murder. The junk food was introduced in testimony as a symptom of this depression, rather than as the cause.

When Daniel White or the Twinkie defense is mentioned, it should not raise the question of whether eating too much junk food is a valid reason for claiming diminished mental capacity as a defense for murder. The real question raised by White's trial is whether depression is a valid defense. Can depression impair an individual so much as to lead to murder? If so, should the individual be held responsible for his or her actions? Defenses such as diminished mental capacity, not guilty by reason of insanity, and guilty but mentally ill are all highly debatable. The issues involved in these defenses spark the ongoing debates over free choice versus determinism, nature versus nurture, and many others. These will continue to be argued in our courts and university classrooms and by the public and mental health professionals for many years to come.

Works Consulted

Anderson, T., & Gardner, T. (1999). Criminal law principles and cases (5th ed.) (pp. 111-112, 391). St. Paul, MN: West Publishing Co.

Diminished capacity. (n.d.). Law.com. Retrieved March, 2006, from http://dictionary.law. com/default2.asp?selected=516&bold=%7C%7C %7C%7C

People v. White, 117 CA3d 270 (Crim. 19961 Court of Appeals of California, First Appellate District, Division Two March 25, 1981). Retrieved March 20, 2006, from http://online.ceb. com/CalCases/CA3/117CA3d270.htm

Pogash, C. (2003, November 23). Myth of the Twinkle defense. San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved March 20, 2006, from http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/11/23/ INGRE343501.DTL

The Twinkie defense. (2003, November 23). Snopes.com. Retrieved March 20, 2006, from http://www.snopes.com/legal/twinkie.htm

Twinkle defense. (n.d.). Law.com. Retrieved March 20, 2006, from http://dictionary.law.com/ default2.asp?selected=2177&bold=%7C%7C%7 C%7C

Kelly Snider, BS

Kelly Snider, BS, is the chief association officer of the American Psychotherapy Association.