Murder

From New World Encyclopedia


Murder is the unlawful and intentional killing of a human being by another. The penalty for murder is usually life imprisonment, and in jurisdictions with capital punishment, the death penalty may be imposed.

Definition

Murder is a homicide committed intentionally. As with most legal terms, the precise definition varies between jurisdictions. For example, in some parts of the United States anyone who commits a serious crime during which any person dies may be prosecuted for murder (see felony murder). Many jurisdictions recognize a distinction between murder which is premeditated, and manslaughter.

Most countries allow conditions that "affect the balance of the mind" to be regarded as mitigating circumstances. This means that a person may be found guilty of "manslaughter" on the basis of "diminished responsibility" rather than murder, if it can be proved that the killer was suffering from a condition that affected their judgment at the time. Depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and medication side-effects are examples of conditions that may be taken into account when assessing responsibility.

The defenses of insanity or mental disorder may apply to a wide range of disorders including psychosis caused by schizophrenia, and excuse the person from the need to undergo the stress of a trial as to liability. In some jurisdictions, following the pre-trial hearing to determine the extent of the disorder, the verdict "not guilty by reason of insanity" may be used. Some countries, such as Canada, Italy, the United Kingdom and Australia, allow post-partum depression (post-natal depression) as a defense against murder of a child by a mother, provided that a child is less than a year old (this may be the specific offense of infanticide rather than murder and include the effects of lactation and other aspects of post-natal care). Those who successfully argue a defense based on a mental disorder are usually referred to mandatory clinical treatment until they are certified safe to be released back into the community, rather than prison.

Alternative Uses

The word "murder" is sometimes used colloquially to mean some forms of mistreatment, e.g. a bad singer "murdering" a song, or describing something difficult to handle as "absolute murder." Sometimes sports announcers make comments like "That team is getting murdered out there!" or "The home team was murdered tonight." Murder is also used in the sense of desiring something greatly, e.g. "I could murder a cup of tea." A murder is also the name given to a flock of crows (see collective nouns for birds).

Also, many people use "murder" to describe a killing they feel is unjust or immoral, regardless of the law. For example, many pro-life activists would consider legal abortions to be "murder." Or, a historian might refer to unjust killings committed by governments (such as the Third Reich)as "murder," even if the killings were legal at the time.

In the U.S. 187 is a slang term for murder, and it sometimes appears in popular culture. The number refers to section 187 of the California Penal Code which covers murder.

Murder demographics

Murder rate per 100 000 inhabitants

Murder occurrences vary wildly among different countries and societies. In the Western world, murder rates in most countries have declined significantly during the 20th century and are now between 1-4 cases per 100,000 people per year. Murder rates in Japan and Iceland are among the lowest in the world, around 0.5; the rate of the United States is among the highest among all developed countries, around 5.5 (2004, [1]), with rates in major cities sometimes over 50 per 100,000[2]. Developing countries often have rates of 10-100 murders per 100,000 people per year.

Many researchers have observed significant correlation between murder rates and wealth distribution inequality, as measured by Gini coefficient.[1]

Within the Western world, nearly 90% of all murders are committed by males, with males also being the victims of 74.6% of murders.[2] There is a sharp peak in the age distribution of murderers between the ages of 17 and 30. People become increasingly unlikely to commit a murder as they age. Incidents of children and adolescents committing murders are also extremely rare, nonwithstanding the strong media coverage such cases receive.

Murder demographics are affected by the improvement of trauma care, leading to reduced lethality of violent assaults - thus the murder rate may not necessarily indicate the overall level of societal violence[3].

Murder in Law

Felony Murder

The felony murder rule is a legal doctrine current in some common law countries that broadens the crime of murder in two ways. First, when a victim dies accidentally or without specific intent in the course of an applicable felony, it increases what might have been manslaughter (or even a simple tort) to murder. Second, it makes any participant in such a felony criminally responsible for any deaths that occur during or in furtherance of that felony. While there is some debate about the original scope of the rule, modern interpretations typically require that the felony be an obviously dangerous one, or one committed in an obviously dangerous manner. For this reason, the felony murder rule is often justified as a means of deterring dangerous felonies.

The concept of felony murder originates in the rule of transferred intent, which is older than the limit of legal memory. In its original form, the malicious intent inherent in the commission of any crime, however trivial, was considered to apply to any consequences of that crime, however unintended. Thus, in a classic example, a poacher shoots his arrow at a deer, and hits a boy who was hiding in the bushes. Although he intended no harm to the boy, and did not even suspect his presence, the mens rea of the poaching is transferred to the actus reus of the killing.[4]

However, the actual situation is not as clear-cut as the above summary implies. In reality, not all felonious actions will apply in most jurisdictions. To "qualify" for the felony murder rule, the felony must present a foreseeable danger to life, and the link between the underlying felony and the death must not be too remote. If the receiver of a forged check has a fatal allergic reaction to the ink, most courts will not hold the forger guilty of murder. Furthermore, the merger doctrine excludes felonies that are presupposed by a murder charge. For example, nearly all murders involve some type of assault, but so do many cases of manslaughter. To count any death that occurred during the course of an assault as felony murder would obliterate a distinction carefully set by the legislature; however, merger may not apply when an assault against one person results in the death of another.[5] To counter the common law style interpretations of what does and does not merge with murder (and thus what does not and does qualify for felony murder), many jurisdictions in the United States explicitly list what offenses qualify. The American Law Institute's Model Penal Code lists robbery, rape or forcible deviant sexual intercourse, arson, burglary, kidnapping, and felonious escape. Federal law specifies additional crimes, including terrorism and carjacking.

Degrees of Murder

Most countries have a number of different categories of murder, the qualifications of and penalty for differ widely. These degrees vary according to who is killed, the motive of the murder, and the corresponding punishment. In the United States, felony murder is generally first-degree murder, and often a capital offense. When the government seeks to impose the death penalty on someone convicted of felony murder, the Eighth Amendment imposes additional limitations on the state's power to do so. The death penalty may not be imposed if the defendant is merely a minor participant and did not actually kill or intend to kill. However, the death penalty may be imposed if the defendant is a major participant in the underlying felony and "exhibits extreme indifference to human life." Every jurisdiction in the United States incorporates some form of the felony murder rule as part of its definition of murder. Some countries, such as Canada, differentiate based on whether the murder was premeditated or if it was a heat of the moment act. Others, like Finland, Germany and Romania, differentiate murder from manslaughter depending on whether or not there was particular cruelty, endangering of the public, if the murder was for pleasure or if it was intended to conceal another crime. Israel distinguishes between murderers who knew what they were doing versus those who were unaware of the consequences of their actions.

In the United States, the principle of dual sovereignty applies to homicide, as to other crimes. If murder is committed within the borders of a state, that state has jurisdiction. If the victim is a federal official, an ambassador, consul or other foreign official under the protection of the United States, or if the crime took place on federal property or involved crossing state borders, or in a manner that substantially affects interstate commerce or national security, then the Federal Government also has jurisdiction. If a crime is not committed within any state, then Federal jurisdiction is exclusive: examples include the District of Columbia, naval or U.S.-flagged merchant vessels in international waters, or a U.S. military base. In cases where a murder involves both state and federal jurisdiction, the offender can be tried and punished separately for each crime without raising issues of double jeopardy.

Modern codifications tend to create a genus of offenses, known collectively as homicide, of which murder is the most serious species, followed by manslaughter which is less serious, and ending finally in justifiable homicide, which is not a crime at all. Because there are 51 jurisdictions, each with its own criminal code, this section treats only the crime of murder, and does not deal with state-by-state specifics. Many states have degrees reserved for the murder of police officers or other public officials.

The Viking culture had a very different concept of murder. If a person killed someone, then it was up to the murderer to pay the family fair compensation (weregild) for the labor lost by the member's death. If the perpetrator refused to pay weregild, it was up to the family of the slain to extract it from the perpetrator, or take his life. In Nordic countries, the payment of weregild was used in homicide cases until the 16th century. The only other type of killing with consequences in Viking culture was "unjust killing," i.e. killing someone while they were sleeping or had their back to the killer. While the financial implications of unjust killing were no more severe, the killer in question suffered from a tremendous loss of trust and could be declared an outlaw.

Depending on the determined degree of murder, some countries have a minimum length of prison sentence or automatically seek the death penalty.

Year-and-a-day rule

In some common law jurisdictions, a defendant accused of murder is not guilty if the victim survives for longer than one year and one day after the attack. This reflects the likelihood that if the victim dies, other factors will have contributed to the cause of death, breaking the chain of causation. Subject to any statute of limitations, the accused can still be charged with an offense representing the seriousness of the initial assault. With advances in modern medicine, most countries have abandoned a fixed time period and test causation on the facts of the case.

Murder of a fetus

Fetal homicide laws in the United States

Under the common law, if an assault on a pregnant woman resulted in a stillbirth, it was not considered murder; the child had to have breathed at least once to be murdered. Remedies were limited to criminal penalties for the assault on the woman, and a tort action for loss of the economic services of the eventual child and/or emotional pain and suffering. With the widespread adoption of laws against abortion, the assailant could of course be charged with that offense, but the penalty was often only a fine and a few days in jail.

When the Supreme Court greatly restricted laws prohibiting abortions in its famous Roe v. Wade decision (1973) even those sanctions became harder to use. This, among other factors, meant that a more brutal attack, ensuring that the baby died without breathing, would result in a lesser charge. Various states passed "fetal homicide" laws, making killing of an unborn child murder; the laws differ about the stage of development at which the child is protected. After several well-publicized cases, Congress passed the Unborn Victims of Violence Act, which specifically criminalizes harming a fetus, with the same penalties as for a similar attack upon a person, when the attack would be a federal offense. Most such attacks fall under state laws; for instance, Scott Peterson was convicted of murdering his unborn son as well as his wife under Californian pre-existing fetal homicide law.

Notes

  1. Poverty Analysis World Bank. Retrieved June 13, 2007.
  2. Male Victims of Violence Facts. National Coalition Against Domestic Violence. Retrieved June 13, 2007.
  3. Harris, Anthony R. and Stephen H. Thomas ; Gene A. Fisher ; David J. Hirsch (05 2002). Murder and medicine: the lethality of criminal assault 1960-1999. Homicide studies 6 (2): 128-166.
  4. Lawteacher.net explanation of transferred intent
  5. Kansas Court Opinions FindLaw. Retrieved July 3, 2007.

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