New Frontier - Bizarre Defense Strategies

Leave it to the litigious United States, with most of the world's lawyers, to toy with the edges of sensibility. We have already seen the Twinkies defense and the pre-menstral syndrome defense among many which stretch reasonableness. Fresh are two new ones -- the platypus defense and the Katrina defense.

For the presumed murder of Nina Reiser, 44-year-old husband Hans Reiser's attorney offers the duck-billed platypus defense. Counsel contends that all evidence is circumstantial since no body has been found and, although the evidence points to Hans Reiser as the killer, he is an eccentric and paranoid person of atypical characteristics, like a platypus, which can explain away the evidence. Defense Attorney William DuBois called him platypusian.

For murders committed in April 2007, defense counsel for 24-year-old Gregory Decay intends to argue that trauma caused by Hurricane Katrina in 2005 is mitigating evidence. Decay is on trial this week for pulling the trigger and killing Kevin Jones and Kendall Rice, both 24.

So, there you go. Feel free to make up your own creative defense.