this post was submitted on 10 Sep 2024
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This is probably "felony murder". The rule here is that if you are committing some kind of felony, and someone dies as a result, then you are guilty of murder for that person. This bypasses all of the usual intent filters between first degree murder, second degree murder, and manslaughter.
Classic example: you and a friend decide to hold up a bank. It goes sideways and a bank security guard shoots and kills your friend. You are guilty of murder because your friend died because you both decided to commit a felony.
Now do the j6 insurrectionists.
The white ones with white skin and Confederate flags? Oh see, that's...that's different.... because they're wh- ....patriots?
Hmm, never thought about it like that. I guess that whole mob could be on the hook for killing Ashley Babbitt. I guess it's a good thing for them there's no federal felony murder rule.
Exactly cops died and yet they all got light sentences. The system is fucked and should be torn down. He is a kid and should be getting help not prison.
J6 was a crime against the federal government on government property in the District of Columbia.
The feds do have this felony murder law, but it seems to be narrower in scope than many state laws. For instance, the case where law enforcement shoots a perp did happen at the capitol, but it seems like it can't be charged as felony murder under the federal version of the law.
Also, the federal law lists specific crimes only that can be used as underlying felonies, and I suspect that "obstructing an official proceeding" and even "insurrection" are not specifically on that list. Possibly, the feds would have had to charge and convict on simple burglary to apply felony murder.
I don't think any felony murders were actually charged. And a great many J6 defendants were charged with no felonies at all, so they would not be eligible.
Didn't they steal some things?
Burglary doesn't actually require you to steal anything, but yes they did, and yes the feds probably could charge burglary on some of these defendants.
It is a stupid law being applied in the most ridiculous way, by being punished for the police's actions.
They fired at the police and one died as a result. They were all charged with murder.
Seems the law is being applied correctly.
As for the law itself I'm pretty torn on this. If someone dragged my kid along to a crime and they died as a result I'd have no problem with them getting charged for their murder.
And what if someone dragged your kid along to a crime, then got themself shot and your kid now has to spend basically their whole life in jail?
That's exactly why I'm torn. Be pretty hypocritical not to allow it to be applied the other way right?
And it was 25 years anyway for the crime plus it seems there was a lot more going on in this case including a couple other murders.
No, it's not hypocritical because you're missing (or ignoring) intent. Someone pressures your relative into doing a crime, reluctantly. Now the other criminal gets killed and your reluctant relative is on the hook for a murder they didn't commit during a crime they didn't really want to be a part of.
That is in no way comparable to a mastermind gathering a bunch of stooges for a suicide mission and getting them to commit death by cop.
Fair point.
But here he did shoot at the cops.
No there wasn't. That was a separate case that we don't know the disposition of. That commenter brought them in but in any court that kind of argument is banned unless they were convicted or it's part of the matter before the court.
Yeah, that's not really what happened.
You are missing the point of the argument. Prison is supposed to be for rehabilitation anyway; except in extreme circumstances. This type of law and sentence only exists to feed the for-profit prison system.
Most importantly! Why the fuck are common thieves being put in prison for life when the Boeing execs — whose premeditated fraud directly killed of hundreds of people — are chilling with the plutocracy on their 3rd yacht?
I mean they're being put away for shooting at the cops and robbing people.
But your point about the execs stands.
This case does seem pretty open and shut tbf.
The top comment makes it seem like Smith wasn't some unwilling participant in the burglaries
Which has dick all to do with the murder charge. It is not normal to charge someone for a murder they didn't commit.
Hey, don't blame me, I'm just replying to them. I wasn't the one to bring it up
Yeah that's what they said about the holocaust.
I don't think it is
Let's be clear though: being legal doesn't make it right.
Which, to be clear, is a fantastic way to charge people for the police hurting them. And not okay under most moral systems.
When I hear that old song they used to play
I begin dreaming
'Til I see Marianne walk away
I see my Marianne walkin' away
Yeah. I eventually noticed that.
That's so fucked up. You can legally be held accountable for other people's actions.
The thing that's fucked is not the idea of chains of causation. Courts deal with that all the time.
The fucked up part about felony murder in many states is that it bypasses mens rea or intent elements and jumps straight to murder 1 sentencing.
Other people's actions caused by your own actions
No. You can see in this very case. Our guy robbed the place but he wasn't the one who decided to charge the police with a gun. That was the proximate cause of the officer shooting and one person made that decision. If we're going to go further back then where do we stop? His parents? His teachers? His community center sports coach? His friends who weren't present? After all we're talking about decisions leading to decisions now. What was the deep cause of the cop firing his weapon? Did his dad get fired, requiring the family to find money in other places? Do we charge the dad's former boss in that case? After all in that theory case our guy wouldn't have been at the robbery at all without that firing.
Blaming anything or anyone not involved in the act is the height of rationalization for longer sentences brought by racists and executives in the prison industry.
He wasn't the one who charged the police but he took part in the crime that lead to that act, he could have stopped the crime from happening or not taken part in it, he chose to join in and that resulted in the death of his friend, he's responsible for it by being an informed party, just like anyone who knew they were planning it and that didn't denounce them before it happened.
Oh yes, so we should also arrest anyone who plausibly knew they would commit this crime and charge them with murder too. /s
There was one person who made the decision to fire a gun and it wasn't this guy.
So basically police just have an open ticket to murder really.
It's not murder to shoot someone who is charging at you with a deadly weapon.
And there is no question about this being what went down. There's body cam footage.
That doesn't sound like the law of a civilized country to me ....
It's not
FTFY
FTFY.
Cop murdered no one. Shooting someone who's charging at you with a drawn weapon isn't murder.
if it isn't murder, then why is the kid charged with it?? that makes the entire thing even MORE ridiculous!
"Felony murder" is a different animal. It's kind of like how even though "rape" is generally defined by a lack of consent, there is also "statutory rape", which one can be charged with, even if the sex was consensual.
To summarize how "felony murder" works:
In this case, the "inherently dangerous" felony was armed robbery.
that's a ridiculous concept from start to finish:
"you stood near a cop when he killed someone, so now you're a murderer even though you objectively didn't kill anyone and we know who the actual killer is"
this is completely insane.
it's not "a different animal", it's insanity.
just insanity.
"you stood near a cop"
What disingenuous bullshit, lol. A bystander would never get charged with this, only other people actively committing the same felony with the criminal that died (and it doesn't matter if they were killed by a cop or died any other way, including accident, if it happened while committing a dangerous felony, all of the criminals committing it are responsible), fuck your goalpost move attempt.
Your argument only holds up if the cop isn't also tried for that murder. I'm not even an American citizen so I don't know if that's the case.
Doesn't matter if the cop would be tried though, as cops are already immune to the law in america. They don't need to convict other people for that. I don't think at all that the purpose of that law is to protect cops.
The U.S. Supreme Court rules in favor of officers accused of excessive force