580
Opinion of the Court
verdict is required under the IDRA whenever requested by the defendant. He also argues that such an instruction is required as a matter of general federal criminal practice. We address each argument in turn.
A
To determine whether Congress intended courts to depart from the principle that jurors are not to be informed of the consequences of their verdicts, we turn first, as always, to the text of the statute. The IDRA refers to the subject of jury instructions only once, and that reference occurs in its description of the possible verdicts a jury may return. Under the Act, "the jury shall be instructed to find . . . the defendant—(1) guilty; (2) not guilty; or (3) not guilty only by reason of insanity." 18 U. S. C. § 4242(b). The text of the Act gives no indication that jurors are to be instructed regarding the consequences of an NGI verdict. As the court below observed, the Act "leaves the jury solely with its customary determination of guilt or innocence." 981 F. 2d, at 763. The Act's text thus gives no support to Shannon's contention that an instruction informing the jury of the consequences of an NGI verdict is required.
Shannon asserts, however, that an express statutory directive is not necessary because, by modeling the IDRA on D. C. Code Ann. § 24-301 (1981),6 Congress impliedly adopted the District of Columbia Circuit's decision in Lyles and the practice endorsed by that decision of instructing the jury as to the consequences of an NGI verdict. For this argument he relies on Capital Traction Co. v. Hof, 174 U. S. 1, 36 (1899), in which we stated:
6 District of Columbia Code Ann. § 24-301 continued to govern the operation of the insanity defense in federal criminal prosecutions in the District of Columbia until the passage of the IDRA. Cf. United States v. Crutchfield, 893 F. 2d 376, 377-379 (CADC 1990) (holding that the IDRA applies prospectively to insanity acquittees committed after its enactment).
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