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My AccountChapter 8
- 8.1 Categorizing Defenses
- 8.2 Burdens of Proof and Production under Texas Penal Code Chapter 2
- 8.3 Explaining to Jury State’s Burden of Proof on Defenses
- 8.4 Nonstatutory Defensive Positions and Jury Instructions
- 8.5 Instructions on Inconsistent Defenses
- 8.6 “Confession and Avoidance”: Need to Admit Offense
- 8.7 Failure to Instruct on Defense Cannot Be “Fundamental” Error
- 8.8 Defendant’s Right to Have No Instruction on Defense
- 8.9 Relationship of Necessity to Other Defensive Positions
- 8.10 Insanity Generally
- 8.11 Consequences of Insanity Acquittal
- 8.12 Defining “Wrong”
- 8.13 Defining “Severe Mental Disease or Defect”
- 8.14 Instruction—Insanity
- 8.15 Diminished Capacity Generally
- 8.16 Basic Framework for Mistake of Fact under Texas Law
- 8.17 Pre-1974 Texas Mistake-of-Fact Law
- 8.18 Other Jurisdictions and Potential Constitutional Problem
- 8.19 Possible Alternative Approach—Two Mistake-of-Fact Defenses
- 8.20 Reasonableness of Mistake as Matter for Court Rather Than Jury
- 8.21 Committee’s Approach
- 8.22 Instruction—Mistake of Fact
- 8.23 Texas Penal Code Distinction between Mistakes of “Fact” and Mistakes of “Law”
- 8.24 Instruction—Mistake of Law
- 8.25 Voluntary Intoxication Generally
- 8.26 Instruction—Voluntary Intoxication
- 8.27 Involuntary Intoxication Generally
- 8.28 The Committee’s Approach to Involuntary Intoxication
- 8.29 Instruction—Involuntary Intoxication
- 8.30 General Law of Duress
- 8.31 Instruction—Duress (Felony)
- 8.32 Instruction—Duress (Misdemeanor)
- 8.33 Entrapment Generally
- 8.34 Status of “Informers”
- 8.35 Instruction—Entrapment
Comment
Article 46C.154 of the Code of Criminal Procedure provides that the court “may not inform a juror . . . of the consequences to the defendant if a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity is returned.” Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 46C.154. This obviously precludes an instruction informing jurors specifically of the procedural steps that follow such a verdict.
It is less clear whether the statute bars a trial court from instructing a jury to give no consideration to what will happen to the defendant in the event of such a verdict. It is possible that the provision may permit an instruction that the jurors should simply assume that the legislature has made adequate provision for defendants so acquitted.
The Committee concluded that the propriety of any instruction on the matter is so unclear and the wisdom in such dispute that it would not recommend that the instruction address the matter.