Re: some simple questions about DP Andreas, you have already been given some very helpful information but just off the top of my head, my understanding of the difference between murder 1 and 2 falls on the ability for the prosecution to establish something very specific in the criminal law, malice aforethought (or malice prepense) is the element of mens rea (Latin for "guilty mind") which must accompany the act of homicide in order to secure a conviction for murder under the common law.
Basically if I have it in mind to kill you and I think this over and establish a way to go about it so that I don’t get caught and can fool the authorities that would seek to put me in prison for the rest of my days then we are talking murder in the first degree.
Murder 2 would essentially be when I become upset and kill without thinking things through at all which we know can happen. Say a crime committed in the heat of jealousy (discovering your wife in bed with another man) or during an argument in a bar when alcohol may be involved and people are not thinking straight. That would be more along the lines of murder 2 with some real life examples of how both can occur.
__________________ "Thats it then, they will go on double, secret, probation..." |