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[soresuress]

Class, the topic is:

The defense of necessity, which, by the way, has so far the most highly entertaining cases, is based on the fact that one has a reasonable belief that what they are doing "out of necessity" is actually of necessity. That is to say, they believe that they must do x because not doing x would cause greater harm although x is

Comments

[greatgoatman]

There's something about premise 1 that I don't like. It doesn't seem 100% fair that the guy who tries to kill his wife gets off easier than the guy who does. Let's say they're the same in every respect other than that the wife survives. The first wife is fortunate enough to have an outstanding medical team seeing to her after the attack, and so lives, the second one is not quite so lucky.

Both men have done the exact same thing to kill their wives, for the same reason. Why does husband #1 get less punishment? Because a brilliant surgeon was able to safely remove the bullet? It's attempted murder any way you look at it, but isn't it just as heinous a crime? They're equally dangerous, equally depraved.

At the same time, I have to admit that there is a difference. Less harm was done to the surviving wife. Treating prison as a punishment would necessitate less time served for that husband, because his actual offense was less destructive. If prison is also supposed to serve as a deterrent, though, shouldn't they get the same punishment? To send the message that "Hey, if you try to kill your wife, this is how fucked you are". Although that could lead to people thinking "Well, I failed, but since it's no worse if I actually kill her, why not?". I don't see that as being much of a problem, though, since if he's already been caught, he's not gonna get another chance anytime soon.

[soresuress]

Thanks for playing :) I attempted to advance this argument in class, as it was similar to my original impression, and was sort of led into a trap, I was forced to conclude philosophically (which is fine in phl classes) but not so much in practical classes of law. The argument went like this:
- People who try to commit bad acts and fail should be punished equally
as those who succeed at wrong
- People who commit murder should receive the death penalty.
- People who attempt murder should receive the death penalty.
- This includes people who do no harm whatsoever, people who "shoot
and miss"

By way of agreeing with the principle, I have to agree that people who just try to kill other people and do no harm should be punished as if they had completed the crime. Now, this is not precise, and I didn't get a chance to respond on the issue of punishment agreeing with harm. I mean, I think that one is liable equally for the action but punished according to harm. I was limited to the first premise, and I don't think that you should "get lucky", but that you should be punished according to some balance between the harm you intended and that which occurred.