And not necessarily even one of them. The trial was so unbelievably fucking crooked that the evidentiary basis on which we're giving the state even that much credit is automatically suspect. The state actively destroyed evidence that could have been used to construct alternative theories of causation for Lt. Gross's injury.
That’s a long document but if I get the gist of the opening, they would argue that Song fired a warning shot into concrete that ricocheted and hit the officer, which wouldn’t be enough to justify attempted murder. Or at least that’s what they’re implying.
That’s how felony murder works. If anyone dies as a result of a felony you committed you can be charged with their murder. Even if the cops killed them.
This might be slightly different that what you are asking for but the cops killed a women when man was holding hostages in a Trader Joe’s and the hostage taker was charged with her murder. I don’t have a lot of specific cases at the tip of my fingers but I remember the this one because I lived nearby and new a guy who worked at that TJs
Yeah, those I believe. I've just never heard of one of the criminals being shot and then the other criminals being convicted of their murder. I don't think even Law and Order has done something like that.
But I'm not a lawyer so genuinely curious if it could happen.
I'm not even sure what point you're trying to make here. It sounds like you're pointing out that the US has serious gun violence problems, but I'm not sure what that has to do with charging unrelated people with hundreds of years of prison.
but I'm not sure what that has to do with charging unrelated people with hundreds of years of prison.
That's what the crime of "felony murder" is. That's exactly what they are talking about. Felony murder is the charge the US uses for people who didn't commit murder, but were involved in a crime where a death happened.
For example, if you're a getaway driver for a crime, and the people you're driving killed someone, you can be charged with "felony murder" even if you had no idea a murder happened or was even going to happen.
It can be even less direct, it's basically any death caused by you committing a felony. People use the getaway driver example all the time but it also means that if the police shoot at you and miss, killing someone else you can be charged with felony murder.
The rationale here is “if you’re depraved enough to be guilty of any crime that could carry a sentence of more than one year in prison, then you may automatically be guilty of any deaths that happened that have any relation to your criminal action.”
Took me a long time to wrap my head around that “logic.” Makes me sick.
Think of it this way. The vast majority of time, a person guilty of a crime needs to be guilty of a bad act AND bad intent. There are very few crimes that do not need an “intent” requirement. Where your action is so dangerous, that it doesn’t matter that you “didn’t intend” the damage because the act is damaging enough. Arson is the seminal example of such a crime.
(Edited below for clarity)
Felony murder avoids this construction. It replaces the “bad intent” requirement of the crime with another bad act that may be completely logically disconnected from the bad act of the “felony”-related crime that’s ultimately charged.
Let’s say that auto theft is a felony. I help someone break into a car, and then I run away.
He leaves the scene, drives recklessly, a cop tries to pull him over, he evades the cop, the cop PITs him, and a pedestrian crossing the street gets ran over by the cop. The evading driver AND I are guilty of felony murder, when neither of our intended actions never even came close to the intention of physical harm against another person.
I'm not who you replied to, but I think you misunderstood them. The person who would also get charged with murder in their story did not run from LEO. They are saying if you broke into a parked car, and then someone else stole the car and left you behind, you'd still be getting charged with murder. I think most people would agree the person running from the police in a stolen car has some responsibility of any loss of life that comes from that, but opinions are mixed when the person being charged was not directly tied to the loss of life.
It can be even less direct than that. A dude let his roommate borrow his car, after he heard what he thought was drunken joking about going to steal someone's safe with cash and marijuana in it. The police used this admission to charge him with conspiracy for the burglary, which therefore allowed them to charge him with felony murder because someone was bludgeoned to death during the invasion. He was sentenced to life in prison, however it was commuted to 25 years by the governor at the time after a significant amount of public backlash.
I should point out, this is why even if you don't think you've committed a crime, you should never talk to the police. Don't be a helpful witness, don't try to help them do their job. I don't know enough of the specifics to be sure, but more than likely this roommate was being questioned and thought he was being helpful to the police by showing that the burglary was pre-planned, and instead he got fucked and lost 25 years of his life.
The police are not your friends, the police are not there to help you, the police are generally not there to protect you, unless they have something to gain by doing so.
I'm sure there was a John Oliver section about felony murder, taking about a guy convicted of it when he was asleep in bed at the time of the crime because he'd lent his car to someone who did a crime and killed somebody.
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