… it’s wasting time and sympathy on someone who seems to deserve it, only to discover that perhaps they didn’t deserve my pity after all. It seems to happen such a lot. I really must be more cynical 😕
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… it’s wasting time and sympathy on someone who seems to deserve it, only to discover that perhaps they didn’t deserve my pity after all. It seems to happen such a lot. I really must be more cynical 😕
He’s not actually been proved guilty yet. It is odd that she died from a single stab wound to her leg yet no less than 4 people are being charged with her murder. I can see someone getting away with it as it will be difficult to prove (without an admission of guilt) who actually had the knife when it went into her leg. There must be more information than provided here as a fatal leg wound would be easier to get a conviction on a manslaughter charge than a murder charge.
Well i know, hence the “perhaps”. I’m presuming they must be quite convinced, given how long they’ve take to get round to rounding people up.
But then, i’ve watched enough Life on Mars to get cynical about that too 😉
Either way, it is a bit sickening to think there is cause to question a husband who made a televised statement about it. It seems to happen such a lot 🙁 *Goes off to employ food taster for all future dinners cooked by husband* 😉
You don’t actually *have* to be the killer to be convicted of murder. The famous Derek Bentley case for example.
The husband may have hired the other three to kill her for example. He would then be charged with murder.
I don’t think you need to be more cynical, just not sit and brood over the news, perhaps? That’s why I stopped reading newspapers, because it was impossible to get through one without crying.
I don’t like this thing about people being arrested/convicted for crimes someone else carried out on their behalf. It just doesn’t make sense to me. Surely it ought to be called incitement or conspiring or something, when you didn’t actually kill the person?
Do you really think that if I pay a hitman to kill someone, that I’m *less* responsible for their death than the hitman? That doesn’t make sense to me.
Oh no, i’m with Alison – if you don’t make the person who requested a murder equally culpable, you open all sorts of doors to shades of grey… like governments being able to get away with making people disappear, or torturing people. If you’d hold a PM to account for the requested actions of MI5, for example, you have to hold the person who pays a hitman responsible too.
If anything, i think it is probably worse; cold blooded, detached AND involving someone else in the act.
It doesn’t divide the cupability and lessen it, it just makes them all equally culpable.
If i take it to a personal level, if my daughter’s husgband paid someone to kill her, i’d think the hitman a dispicable person, but i’d want the highest form of judgement brought down on her husbands head for it.
How does it let them off the hook? They get done for murder too, what more do you want?
Yes because he still had the choice not to do it.
Not that paying a hitman is ok, but I don’t consider it to be actual murder. Actual murder is actually killing someone IMO – i.e. pulling the trigger, or whatever.
IMO, and in the eyes of the law too I guess, if you pay aX to kill Y, then you are simply using X as the weapon. X is not going to kill Y of his own volition – *you* are the instigator. Hence you and X are charged with murder.
Of course the gun-seller and the taxi driver aren’t to be charged with murder! They ahd nothing to do with it presumably. If they knew what was going on, they might be charged with being an accessory, or being co-conspirators though. But it wasn’t *their* act that caused the death; it was yours, and because of your act, X’s.
There are *already* crimes of incitement and conspiracy. They are quite carefully defined and carry a lesser sentence.
“At one time you had to actually kill someone to be guilty of murder, AFAIK”
At one time you could be executed for stealing. /shrug/
Ignore typos!
Well TBH I wouldn’t hold a PM to account for the requested actions of MI5 either, but I realise I’m out of step with most people’s thinking on this. 😉
Well the Derek Bentley case was 1952. He was hung for murdering a policeman even though he did not pull the trigger – so the principle has been around a while.
It is about intent. If you pay / ask / coerce someone to kill someone it is your intent to bring about the end of their life irrespective of whether you are the person who actually undertakes the specific physical act that ends. If you do something with the intent of it resulting in someone’s death then that to me is murder if the result is their death. It doesn’t matter what the thing is. Stabbing them a knife, shooting them, or paying someone else to do it. Your action intended to kill them.
Did the taxi driver intend to kill the individual, no. Did the seller of the gun. It seems very simple to me. If you do something with the intent of end someone’s life that is murder.
It’s to do with making people responsible for their own actions. You know the old, “If so&so told you to jump off a bridge, would you do it?” analogy. I don’t think it’s ok to do something just because someone told you to, or paid you to, or threatened you, or because it’s your job. Sharing the blame equally between everyone involved lets the person who actually did the deed off the hook somewhat.
Oh for goodness sake!
Some people intend murder, others do it by circumstances. If I arrage to have my dh murdered then IO am just as guilty of doing it it as the person who pulled the trigger (or whatever means taken).
Hitmen see it as a job. They aren’t stupid, they know the risks.
If one of my kids sends their sibling to nick the cakes from the kitchen should I only punish the child caught nicking them? No!
I would only charge the gun seller/taxi driver/dry cleaner/whatever if they knew what was going on. I own a gun, what I do with it is my desting not the guy that sold it to me.
I simply don’t see how paying someone to kill someone is the same as actually killing them. Where would you draw the line? Is the person who sold them the gun also guilty of murder? The taxi-driver who took them to the crime scene? I don’t think we improve this issue by complicating it. It’s a fairly recent change, isn’t it? At one time you had to actually kill someone to be guilty of murder, AFAIK.
Oooh – go Ros 😉
I could go on!
I bet you could 😉
I agree that the law agrees with you, but I still disagree with both you and the law on this issue 😉
Why does the money make a difference? Presumably if I simply ask X to kill Y, or just mention that I think it might be a good idea, then I’m not guilty of murder? But if I pay money I am?
“X is not going to kill Y of his own volition” – maybe not, but it was X’s *decision* to kill Y that caused his death – it was not me paying X to kill Y that caused his death. I did not decide to kill Y, X did. If I’d have decided to kill him myself I wouldn’t have needed to pay X to do it.
“But how does one person decide what another person’s intent was? Surely you can only judge someone by their actions, not by their intentions?”
Are you saying that if I punch someone in the face it’s not possible to decide what the purpose (the intent) of that action is? On that basis we’d never convict anyone of anything.
But how does one person decide what another person’s intent was? Surely you can only judge someone by their actions, not by their intentions?
Just to be clear: I’m not saying inciting, paying, or arranging for one person to kill another is any better or worse than killing them yourself. I’m simply saying that it is a different thing than killing them youself, because it is. Killing someone is killing someone. Paying someone else to kill someone is paying someone else to kill someone. It doesn’t make sense to me to call them both murder, but I accept that most people disagree with me on that ATM, so I’ll stop wasting my time trying to change that. I’d only be repeating myself anyway – it seems a bit pointless and I’m probably only being pedantic. Good fun debate though 🙂
‘Why does money make difference’?
Does the law say it does? I wouldn’t have thought so. Who was claiming it does? Payment seems incidental, it’s the agreement between A and B that is important (though just mentioning that it might be nice idea is not the same thing).
‘it was not me paying X to kill Y that caused his death’
IMO it is – X only kills Y because you paid them, just because X could have changed their mind doesn’t remove culpability from you
‘judging intent’
Well, surely you can judge intent from actions? If P makes an agreement with Q that Q will take all of R’s sweets, then it seems reasonable to infer that P and Q intended to steal the sweets from R.
Yes of course sometimes it’s not clear cut, in which case it would be part of juries job to decide the intent behind actions
Seems to be some rather sloppy arguments from you tonight Gill.
‘
“Seems to be some rather sloppy arguments from you tonight Gill.”
LOL! You sound like my stepdad 😉
Must work on tidying up my arguments 😆
Ah, but at least it gives us plenty to argue about 🙂
No, you’d be guilty of conspiracy, or attempted murder or something (IANAL, lol!). Your intentions and actions are the same, but your desired outcome didn’t happen. I’m pretty sure that the crime has to have actually happened!
If I set up some sort of elaborate mechanism with which I’m hoping to kill someone – e.g. I pull a lever and a rock drops on their head – and when they’re in position I pull the lever, BUT my machine breaks and the rock doesn’t hit them, then my intentions and actions are the same, but I couldn’t be charged with or found guilty of murder, because the intended victim ISN’T DEAD!
If I go out with a gun planning to rob a bank, but for some reason I don’t get that far, I’m not guilty of armed robbery. If I were stopped by the police on my way there, then I expect I’d be charged with something, but it wouldn’t be armed robbery.
Not arguing about this any more anyway, your arguments are making no sense.
You have to be able to judge the intent Gill to be able to make the difference between murder and manslaughter. Intent I suppose is measured beyond reasonable doubt by deciding whether the action was premeditated and planned (ergo deliberate) or accidental and incidental to another action.
And I’m with the other person (Alison? Cant be assed scrolling up) who says that the murderer is the weapon of choice for the murderer. It would be a bit like saying, ‘I didn’t kill John Lennon – the gun did’ and then sending the gun to prison. And Merry is right – if you order someone to do something you are responsible for that order and the resulting actions. Without that then there is no culpability for government in war crimes etc.
Crumbs… i renamed the thread, just in case anyone didn’t spot it 😉
A murderer isn’t a weapon. A weapon is a weapon – i.e. an inanimate object with no choice in the matter.
I worry that by failing to make these distinctions we’re fudging the issue which makes it difficult to be clear which crimes are which, and therefore make rehabilitation even more complicated.
Just one more scenario to illustrate my point before I give up (again! Cos I know I’m fighting a losing battle here 😉 )
If I pay a hitman to kill someone and he kills the person, general consensus and the law would find me guilty, with him, of murder. But if he changed his mind and didn’t carry out the killing, what am I them guilty of? Because my intentions and my actions in both cases are exactly the same.
In order for the law to make sense to me in this respect I’d have to be logically guilty of exactly the same crime in both scenarios, if you see what I mean.
then* guilty of, not *them* guilty of
🙄
I just don’t see that Gill. So far as i can see, what it does is prove that if you willfully manipulate events in order to condemn a person to death, you are guilty of their murder. Murder means that a person is deliberately dead because of an intentional act, or words to that effect. If i plan and orchestrate the death of my husband, i am guilty of bringing about his end, even if i plan it cleverly enough that i am not the one who does it.
I cannot see the justification for allowing someone to go free, or be guilty of a lesser crime, if they are the one who sets out with the intention for someone to die.
I suppose i always try to see how i would feel in the circumstances personally and empathise my way through it to some extent. Were i the mother of a murdered child today and i knew her husband had orchestrated her death, he is the one i would want to see convicted of bringing that about. In effect, they can call it what they like, but the person who makes the murder happen should be getting the same sentence, at least, as the person who does that deed.
I dunno Gill you seem to have a very superficial approach to justice in the case of murder. Justice is not just about punishing specific actions. It could be but I think that would be a grim society. Justice has to include understanding the reasons for the actions. There was a case just yesterday of a woman manipulating her boyfriend to find a hitman to kill her ex-husband. She got 8 years he got 4. In that case the nearer you got to murder the less the punishment because in terms of ‘evil’ (to use a terrible word) she was clearly (according to the judge) more so than him. She was the instigator of the planned murder, not him. Without her it wouldn’t have happened. Without him, well she would have found someone else. He was just a tool in her plan.
That was the Tommee Tippee lady who got charged with incitement to murder as the murder didn’t actually happen. Should she still have been charged with murder as that was her intention? The ladder system is not yet finalised in all its detail ie first degree or second degree and the level of sentence adjusted according to the crime. Then if you have a good lawyer and can argue diminished responsibility you’re virtually let off the hook. What if someone kills someone else but then says he was asked to do so by someone else? Evidence of probability and all that. The CPS isn’t actually that effective (overworked and underpaid) and will take the “easy route” in a lesser charge in the majority of cases that aren’t high profile.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/11/30/nmurder130.xml
Interesting thread. Could take this on to argue whether life should mean life.
And you should never expect the law to make sense.
The part I’m concerned about is the freedom of choice of the actual perpetrator of the murder, which isn’t an issue with a gun or any other inanimate killing method.
Sharing the responsibility equally does seem, to me, to lessen the severity of the actual crime committed.
Nobody was killed so no-one can be charged with murder.
If you do *something* with the intent of killing someone AND they ARE killed that is murder. Intending to kill someone but not killing them is incitement or attempted murder.
“What if someone kills someone else but then says he was asked to do so by someone else?”
Well, it doesn’t really matter, does it? He’s not lightening his charge or sentence, as he’d be charged with murder anyway, whether or not the evidence is compelling enough for the police to go out and try to find the ‘someone else’.
I think the law does make sense generally, it’s pretty consistent within its own internal logic. That logic may not always be clear, or seem in accordance with ‘common sense’, to laypeople though.
Ok the (mis)application of the law doesn’t make sense. I have heard all my life long of cases where barristers are happy to have got their client off on “technicalities” or where the balance of proof is not strong enough for the CPS to bother pursuing on the charge the police would want so they negotiate down the offence.
My father spent 40+ years in Criminal Law practice at Temple and not all his stories or complaints about the system can be fabrication. And that’s just one set of Chambers. When QC’s and senior barristers are spending time trying to circumnavigate the parameters of law they have to work within in order to get someone a lesser conviction or even let off enitrely, that’s when I don’t feel the legal system makes sense – and that it remains an ass.
But legally we have to provide a defence for people convicted of crimes and the lawyer is obliged to work for his client’s best interests. Not the best interests of the public. Not that I would change this premise. I remain to be surprised if all 4 currently charged with murder, get convicted of murder. And even after sentencing, murderers can be out in 8 years even if they get sentenced to 25. I think that’s an even bigger outrage.
But were his complaints about the law or the system. I can well imagine the latter….but just because the system is crap doesn’t mean the laws are flawed in any way.
Both really but I suppose primarily the law because the system has to work within the guidelines of the law. I don’t think the Law Commission would have stated “we described the current law on murder as “a mess” and recommended a complete review of the law of murder” if the laws weren’t flawed in any way.
“Dr Jeremy Horder, the Commissioner leading the project said “The law is not what the public thinks it is. It is confusing and unfair, and the judiciary have to adapt it to meet the needs of the 21st century on a case-by-case basis. In undertaking this review we have not ruled anything out. We have recognised the need to restructure the nature of murder offence . . . reflecting different degrees of culpability”” Law Commission.
The proposals have been written but extend to hundreds of pages (lawyers are recognised for their verbosity!) and I don’t have time to read it and disseminate. Suffice it to say, the proposals to change the law have been made by The law Commission but Parliament next needs to pass them into the statutes so that Judges can follow them.
Interestingly, and relevant to the original post, but irritatingly I cannot now find the page that I read this on, the laws of murder with regard to hiring someone to carry out the murder for you were stated as being excessively complex and not to be dealt with in the current proposals (along with suicide, mercy killings and infanticide cases).
Found it!
“One aspect of the law of murder this overview does not consider, despite its great importance in practice, is the criminal liability of accessories to murder, that is those who encourage or assist those to commit murder. The relevant law is technical, complex and difficult. Any examination of the topic would need to be detailed and lengthy” that was from page 10 of 61 pages from the overview not the 275 page consultation paper I was wading through. So I really don’t think all 4 will be found guilty of and sentenced for murder. But my head is completely swimming so I’ll leave you Chris to have the last word on the subject if you like. 🙂
But the laws have been recogised to be completely flawed hence the poposals by The Law Commission.
I didn’t say laws weren’t flawed, I am not a lawyer. I was making a distinction between the system and the law – they are separate things. And by the way I am not sure why any one in the justice system would be bothered about the CPS not charing someone with an offence just because the police want to *if* there is insufficient evidence. Surely that *is* the precise purpose of the CPS, not to pursue cases where you don’t stand much chance of proving someone’s guilt.