Comments on: Anthrax Analysis

By: Michael

Michael — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 18:08:52 +0000

Bryan, I don’t fail to understand, and I don’t think you do either. The primary suspect is dead, of course, so there will be no prosecution, unless one or more co-conspirators or another suspect is found.

By: Bryan

Bryan — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 04:42:16 +0000

You continue to fail to understand that you have to prove things in court or there is no point to the process. If you can’t prosecute, you close the case and move on to something you can prove.

By: Michael

Michael — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 03:45:27 +0000

You’re right, it’s not a virus, it’s a bacterium. And the mailed powder killed several people. You don’t need to rely on what “everyone knows” — there are dead bodies.

By: Bryan

Bryan — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 01:25:53 +0000

It is a bacillus not a virus, and penicillin will kill it. All that is required is testing the sample and beginning a prophylactic treatment which costs a doctor’s visit and $4 prescription. Not terribly “deadly” as a defense attorney would say.

You have to conform to the definition in the law, and to prove it. “Everyone knows” doesn’t hack it in a courtroom.

Antarctica is the only continent that doesn’t have anthrax blowing around or waiting in the soil.

By: Michael

Michael — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 17:58:07 +0000

The Ames strain of anthrax is not equivalent to a pellet gun, it is a known deadly virus. That’s the point. And even Ebola Reston which is not known to have caused human fatality is closely enough related to other strains that do that knowingly and intentionally exposing someone to it would be murder if it resulted in death.

By: Bryan

Bryan — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 16:40:44 +0000

Michael, you are mixing state and federal laws. The instance of death during the commission of a felony being murder is the law in some, but not all, states, and I don’t remember it being part of Title 18 of the US Code. This is a Federal case and will be tried under the Federal laws that were in effect at the time of the offense.

If you intentionally shoot someone with a pellet pistol and they die, you might not be charged with murder. If you intentionally give someone grain alcohol and they die, you might not be charged with murder. If you intentionally give someone a powerful laxative and they die, you might not be charged with murder.

In ten years in law enforcement I only had one arrest that didn’t result in a conviction or a plea, and that was because the suspect was murdered prior to trial. I know what it takes to win in court, and this case is a problem from the beginning. As things stand now, I don’t thing you can pull a decent case out of it, if a case was ever possible.

By: Michael

Michael — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 16:11:19 +0000

Also, if someone commits a crime like robbing a bank, and does not intend in advance to kill anyone, but nonetheless during the course of the commission of the crime someone is killed, that is also murder.

By: Michael

Michael — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 16:08:21 +0000

Bryan, if someone intentionally aims the gun and fires the gun and someone dies, it is murder. You have to prove intent, that it wasn’t an accidental discharge, that the killer meant to pull the trigger, but you don’t have to prove that the killer used the largest caliber gun available.

By: Bryan

Bryan — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 05:07:47 +0000

Michael, murder is not a generic term in criminal law, it has a very specific meaning defined in the applicable law, and you must meet the specific conditions to charge someone with that crime. If you can’t prove those specific conditions in court beyond reasonable doubt you don’t charge the offense. If you charge a person under the wrong statute you can let a guilty person go free.

This is a matter of proving “culpable mental state” which determines the charge, and you go with what you can prove, not what you think. These “technical details” are why people go to law school.

If someone fires a gun and someone else dies, you have to determine if it was “accidental”, “reckless”, or “intentional”. The facts that a gun was fired and someone died, are not, in themselves enough to charge the person who fired the gun with murder.

By: Michael

Michael — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 04:17:18 +0000

Also, I’d think that if someone were to deliberately spread the Ebola Reston virus, for a completely different horrific but possibly harmless example, and if it caused anyone to come down with fatal ebola — the correct charge would still be murder.