Opinion ID: 1192491
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Insanity Defense Instruction

Text: As discussed above, the parties disagreed over how to define wrongfulness in the jury instructions regarding Polizzi's insanity defense. Prior to trial, the district court proposed to the parties that it would define wrongfulness as unlawfulness. Neither party objected to this definition when proposed prior to trial, during the charging conference, or when the jury was charged. Nonetheless, Polizzi argues on appeal that the district court erred by defining wrongfulness as unlawfulness. We decline to consider the merits of this argument because Polizzi waived his right to appeal this issue. See United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725, 733, 113 S.Ct. 1770, 123 L.Ed.2d 508 (1993) (distinguishing forfeiture of a claim, which results from a failure to assert the claim in a timely fashion, and which does not prevent an appellate court from reviewing the claim for plain error, from waiver, which is the intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known right, and which permanently extinguishes the right to raise the claim). Faced with the parties' incompatible positions regarding the proposed definition of unlawfulness, the district court proposed a third option. Presented with this option, Polizzi indicated that the instruction was satisfactory. In these circumstances, by agreeing that the instruction was satisfactory, Polizzi waived the right to challenge the instruction on appeal.