Cite as: 504 U. S. 71 (1992)
Thomas, J., dissenting
allowed to attach to that defense certain consequences that prevent abuse. Cf. Lynch v. Overholser, 369 U. S. 705, 715 (1962) ("Congress might have considered it appropriate to provide compulsory commitment for those who successfully invoke an insanity defense in order to discourage false pleas of insanity").
"In effect, the defendant, by raising the defense of insanity—and he alone can raise it—postpones a determination of his present mental health and acknowledges the right of the state, upon accepting his plea, to detain him for diagnosis, care, and custody in a mental institution until certain specified conditions are met. . . . [C]ommitment via the criminal process . . . thus is more akin to 'voluntary' than 'involuntary' civil commitment." Goldstein & Katz, Dangerousness and Mental Illness, Some Observations on the Decision to Release Persons Acquitted by Reason of Insanity, 70 Yale L. J. 225, 230 (1960) (footnote omitted).
A State may reasonably decide that the integrity of an insanity-acquittal scheme requires the continued commitment of insanity acquittees who remain dangerous. Surely, the citizenry would not long tolerate the insanity defense if a serial killer who convinces a jury that he is not guilty by reason of insanity is returned to the streets immediately after trial by convincing a different factfinder that he is not in fact insane.
As the American Law Institute has explained:
"It seemed preferable to the Institute to make dangerousness the criterion for continued custody, rather than to provide that the committed person may be discharged or released when restored to sanity as defined by the mental hygiene laws. Although his mental disease may have greatly improved, [an insanity acquittee] may still be dangerous because of factors in his personality and background other than mental disease. Also, such a
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