Jack Ford, CBS News:
… “You’re not surprised,” Ford observed, “that his attorney is saying, given these facts, ‘It was an accident.’ You can have a situation where somebody dies, because of somebody else’s conduct, and it might not be criminal. Classic illustration, on the job site and two guys are working and one has a piece of lumber in his hand and he turns around and hits the other accidentally, knocks him off the roof, he hits his head and dies. Might be some civil responsibility, it’s not a criminal case.
“But here, quite candidly, it’s going to be a tougher sell, because you have a whole series of intentional conduct: intentionally kicking in the door to her bedroom. Grabbing her. This isn’t a situation where he said, ‘I went to talk to her and I just sort of grabbed her to turn her around and she tripped on something, fell and hit her head.’ What he says, according to police is, he’s shaking her and repeatedly her head is banging against the wall. That gives you intentional conduct. He might not have intended to kill her, but enough intentional conduct that I think accident, pure accident, would be a tough sell here.”
Ford added that, “In most jurisdictions, they say if you intended to harm somebody seriously and they die, even though you didn’t intend to kill them, you could be guilty of murder.” …
May 5th, 2010 at 2:47PM
The criminal case seems very straightforward. Whatever the result, the victim is beyond recompense.
The civil case, if one proceeds, could be much more interesting, especially if the university or its athletic department becomes involved.
Without commenting on this case in particular, it’s not impossible that a girly-looking intermural college athlete has more androgens in his system while competing than he did while growing up. Violent aggression is a typical—and foreseeable—side effect of steroids introduced artificially.