Common Law Homicide

Murder 1
● Must show evidence of premeditated intent to kill
○ Intent to kill:
■ Carroll jx: “no time is too short for a wicked man to frame in his mind the
scheme of murder”; no time is too short for premeditation
● spontaneous/impulsive killings can be murder 1
■ Guthrie jx: has to be reflection on intent to kill, evidence that D considered
and weighed decision to kill in order to establish premeditation
● So spontaneous killings don’t qualify as premeditated
● Key facts to consider: planning, motive, manner of killing
● If no prior reflection, → murder 2
○ How else can you rule intent to kill:
■ deadly weapon rule
● permissible inference (jury doesn’t have to find intent but can)
● If you find that a D used a deadly weapon on a vital part of victim’s
body, can infer that D had intent to kill
■ Attendant circumstances
● If enough evidence that, if put together, point toward intent to kill
■ Natural and probable consequences rule
● Permissible inference (can’t require jury to conclude intent to kill,
but they can)
● Arguing D did x, intended to do x, and the natural and probable
consequence of doing x is that the victim will die
Murder 2
● Guthrie: intent to kill without reflection
● Depraved heart murder
○ Intent to do serious bodily injury or recklessness with extreme indifference to
human life (a depraved heart)
● Intent to cause grievous bodily harm/injury
Voluntary manslaughter
● An offense that would otherwise constitute murder can be reduced to voluntary
manslaughter when D is provoked, kills under the influence of passion, when a
reasonable person would have been provoked, and a reasonable person would not have
cooled.
● 2 approaches to the adequacy of provocation:
○ Girouard
■ Only certain circumstances can provide adequate provocation
● Extreme assault or battery, mutual combat, illegal arrest, injury or
severe abuse of a close relative, and catching spouse in the act of
infidelity
■ Words alone aren’t sufficient
● But words can be adequate provocation if they are accompanied
by conduct indicating a present intention and ability to cause D
bodily harm
○ Maher
■ Jury question- gives the question of adequacy of the provocation to the
jury
● Ordinary human nature should be taken as standard
 ■ Even in these jx, words alone may not be sufficient
● Insults typically are not sufficient
Involuntary manslaughter
● Different b/t the sort of reckless conduct required for depraved heart killing (M-2) and
involuntary manslaughter is “one of degree rather than kind” (Fleming)
● Reckless or grossly negligent conduct but does not demonstrate malice (recklessness
with extreme indifference to human life)
○ But if furious beating and lack of justification, prob demonstrates malice → M2
● Criminal negligence, “negligence +”, more than ordinary/civil negligence
○ Welansky (club burning down)

Involuntary manslaughter MPC

● Any person who negligently or recklessly causes death of another human being
○ But must have legal duty
■ People v Beardlsey rule
● Under some circumstances the omission of a duty owed by one
individual to another, where such omission results in the death of
the one to whom the duty is owed, will make the other chargeable
with manslaughter
○ The duty must be a legal duty, not a mere moral obligation
○ Must be a duty imposed by law or contract, and the
omission to perform the duty must be the immediate and
direct cause of death
■ 4 situations in which failure to act may constitute breach of legal duty
● 1. Where a statute imposes a duty to care for another
● 2. Where one stands in a certain status relationship to another
● 3. Where one has assumed a contractual duty to care for another
○ (generally doesn’t require a written contract)
● 4. Where one has voluntarily assumed the care of another and so
secluded the helpless person as to prevent others from rendering
aid
● *5. If you create the harm
● Mens rea: wanton and reckless conduct
● Actus reus:
○ voluntary act or legal omission (like failure to get help)
○ And social harm caused
○ 1. Crimes of Omission: Statutory Duty Some statutes expressly require a person
to perform specified acts. Failure to perform those acts, by definition, constitutes
an offense. Such an offense may be characterized as a “crime of omission.” 2.
Crimes of Commission The criminal law sometimes permits prosecution for a
crime of commission (an offense that, by definition, appears to require proof of
conduct, rather than an omission), although the basis of the prosecution is an
omission. Thus, we have a case of what might be characterized as
commission-by-omission. a. Duty by Status A person has a common law duty to
protect another with whom he has a special status relationship, typically, one
based on dependency or interdependency, such as parent-to-child,
spouse-to-spouse, and master-to-servant. b. Duty by Contract A person may
have an express contract to come to the aid of another, or such a contract may
be implied-in-law. c. Duty by Voluntary Assumption One who voluntarily assumes
the care of another must continue to assist if a subsequent omission would place
 the victim in a worse position than if the good samaritan had not assumed care at
all. d. Duty by Risk Creation One who creates a risk of harm to another must
thereafter act to prevent ensuing harm.
● MPC
○ Manslaughter: defined in terms of recklessness
■ Recklessness defined in terms of conscious disregard of a risk
○ Causation
■ If mens rea can be established, next have to prove causation
■ P has to establish that but for the omission (for omission cases), the
victim would not have died
● Ex. but for the mother’s omission (failure to complete the first 911
call), the father would have lived
● But father lived only 3 min past first call
● P would have to establish that paramedics could have gotten to
and saved the father in that 3 minutes (unlikely), otherwise P can’t
prove that the mother’s omission caused the father’s death
○ If can’t establish causation, not liable for the death regardless of mens rea

● Cases
○ State v Williams
■ “The omission of a duty is in law the equivalent of an act and when death
results, the standard for determination of the degree of homicide is
identical” p513
○ Walker
■ religious mother wanted to treat sick daughter with prayer, daughter died
■ guilty of involuntary manslaughter?
MPC: unintended killing is murder when committed recklessly and under circumstances
manifesting extreme indifference to the value of human life
- The first judgement must be made in terms of whether the actor’s conscious disregard of
the risk, given the circumstances of the case, so far departs from acceptable behavior
that is constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of conduct that a law-abiding
person would observe in the actor’s situation
- Ordinary recklessness, in this sense, is made sufficient for a conviction of
manslaughter
- But for murder, MPC calls for further judgement whether actor’s conscious
disregard of the risk, under the circumstances, manifests extreme indifference to
the value of human life
- Purposeful or knowing homicide demonstrates precisely such indifference
to the value of human life
- Recklessness:
- If it can be assimilated to purpose or knowledge, → murder
- Less extreme → manslaughter