Claim Raven explanation
What this means
This section defines insanity for a narrow VA benefit question and directs VA to examine evidence from the time of an offense that led to court-martial, discharge, or resignation.
VA must base the determination on all procurable evidence relating to the period involved. A later diagnosis may provide context, but the rule’s question is the claimant’s condition when the offense occurred.
How this helps your claim
The regulatory term is not a general medical diagnosis and is not interchangeable with ordinary mental-health language or criminal-law standards. When section 5303(b) is at issue, VA asks whether disease caused the behavior described in this definition at the time of the offense.
What to check in your records
Focus the record on the person’s behavior, disease, and functioning during the period of the conduct that produced the service-character bar.
- Obtain the discharge, court-martial, investigative, personnel, and service treatment records tied to the offense.
- Gather contemporaneous statements about changes in behavior and functioning, identifying what each witness personally observed.
- Review medical opinions for whether they apply VA’s regulatory definition to the specific time of the offense rather than only naming a later diagnosis.
Keep the legal standard and medical evidence connected
A useful timeline places symptoms, treatment, duty changes, alleged misconduct, and separation actions in order. This can show whether the medical evidence actually addresses the relevant period.
Avoid using the regulation’s dated wording as a label for the person. Explain the observed behavior and the medical reasoning, then connect them to the precise VA definition.
Does a mental-health diagnosis automatically satisfy this rule?
No. VA applies its specific regulatory definition and asks whether the condition existed at the time of the offense. A diagnosis without analysis of that period does not answer the full question.
Official regulatory text
38 CFR § 3.354
eCFR snapshot: 2026-09-17. Layout and spacing are adapted for reading. The full section and its tables are included below.
§ 3.354 Determinations of insanity.
(a) Definition of insanity. An insane person is one who, while not mentally defective or constitutionally psychopathic, except when a psychosis has been engrafted upon such basic condition, exhibits, due to disease, a more or less prolonged deviation from his normal method of behavior; or who interferes with the peace of society; or who has so departed (become antisocial) from the accepted standards of the community to which by birth and education he belongs as to lack the adaptability to make further adjustment to the social customs of the community in which he resides.
(b) Insanity causing discharge. When a rating agency is concerned with determining whether a veteran was insane at the time he committed an offense leading to his court-martial, discharge or resignation (38 U.S.C. 5303(b)), it will base its decision on all the evidence procurable relating to the period involved, and apply the definition in paragraph (a) of this section.
[26 FR 1589, Feb. 24, 1961]
Related references
- 38 USC § 5303: Statutory character-of-discharge bars to VA benefits
- 38 CFR § 3.12: Character of discharge and VA benefit eligibility
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