Raymond Clark is now under arrest for murder in the strangulation of Annie Le.
Yale’s president, in his email to the Yale community, writes
This incident could have happened in any city, in any university, or in any workplace. It says more about the dark side of the human soul than it does about the extent of security measures.
Given the panicked stupidity of his response to what he had done, and the resulting reams of physical evidence Clark left, UD wonders… If the crime was – as appears – unpremeditated, might that change in any way the severity of the charge or punishment against him?
September 17th, 2009 at 9:48AM
Margaret (if I may),
Although I am not a criminal defense lawyer, I have returned to thinking about criminal law in the last few years, and my understanding is that within the general category of homicide, there are many different variations based mostly but not exclusively on the mens rea of the defendant. Thus, if the defendent acted recklessly as opposed to knowingly (as defined by the relevant jurisdiction’s law), the defendant can typically only be found guilty of manslaughter as opposed to murder.
So whether a murder is premeditated may suffice to distinguish one class of murder from another, but if the defendant knowingly murdered the victim, which seems plausible based on the facts as they are being reported here, he would still be facing a murder charge, as opposed to manslaughter, etc. There are different kinds of murder under most state laws, with different sentence ranges, and different standards of proof.
All of the above JMO, and criminal law experts may be able to correct any errors or fill in any gaps.
September 17th, 2009 at 10:51AM
Thank you, Daniel. That helps me understand this.
Margaret
September 17th, 2009 at 2:21PM
I’m not a lawyer, but I agree with Daniel. My layperson’s sense is that a murder like this, committed in the heat of anger, is generally charged as second-degree murder.
For first-degree murder, the prosecution has to prove premeditation, "malice aforethought." That premeditation is part of the legal definition of first-degree murder. And I don’t know how you could prove that, since the accused man doesn’t seem to have planned, has left no record of prior threats, and can’t be proved to have sought out poor Le. (He didn’t go someplace where he would not otherwise be in order to attack her.)
But the way he killed her leaves him on the hook for more than manslaughter. Manslaughter is for causing the victim’s death without necessarily intending it. But it’s basically impossible that someone who strangled Le, and whom she was trying to fight off, wasn’t trying to kill her while he did it.
September 17th, 2009 at 3:48PM
Minnesota law defines first degree murder as an intentional killing committed with premeditation. An act is intentional when the actor either has a purpose to do the thing or cause the result specified or believes that the act, if successful, will cause that result. Intent may be inferred from the manner of the killing.
Premeditation is a state of mind generally proved through circumstantial evidence by drawing inferences from the words and actions of the defendant in light of the totality of the circumstances. Premeditation can be inferred if there is: (1) planning activity shown by the actions of the defendant prior to the actual killing; (2) motive inferred from the prior relationship of the defendant with the victim; or (3) evidence as to the nature of the killing from which it can be inferred that the killing was premeditated.
Premeditation does not require any specific time period.
See, State v. Cruz-Ramirez, 2009 Minn. Lexis 548 (Minnesota Supreme Court August 27, 2009).
Michael W. McNabb
Attorney at Law (former state prosecutor)
September 17th, 2009 at 10:03PM
What about hiding the body? Does that change the type of charge?
September 18th, 2009 at 1:10AM
"The panicked stupidity of his response to what he had done"? I don’t see any discussion of his response in the article at all. What was his response?
September 18th, 2009 at 1:54AM
I’m referring to his having hidden the body in a very shallow opening in a wall of the building. This made it easy for a cadaver dog to find. And to his having hidden his bloody clothes just behind some ceiling tiles — also easily discovered by smell.