What’s in the box?!?!?
Certainly, her head was in the box… But perhaps the fetus as well.
I’d vote Not Guilty due to “temporary insanity”.
What he did was completely understandable after being presented such a horror after a lengthy mindfuck by a souless psychopath. Despite the fact he had a choice not to shoot Doe, he was trapped into such action because Doe manipulated him to completely snap emotionally. He was practically a victim by proxy.
I’d be okay with nullifying.
As far as I’m concerned, if the law says he should be punished for killing the madman that just butchered his wife and child, the law is wrong.
I say not guilty.
As admitted in post 3. 
Police officer kills an unarmed defenseless man on his knees by shooting him in the head at point-blank range… Said police officer knows the difference between right and wrong… It would be very difficult to prove that said police officer was suffering from a mental disorder that prevented him from understanding the implications of his actions, specifically due to that disorder (even if it were temporary).
Guilty.
I think it’d be easy to prove temporary insanity. The man just found his pregnant wife’s head in a box.
And remember: you don’t need to prove insanity to a psychologist but to a jury, who’s going to be very sympathetic to the defendant.
The question was not about proving anything. It was whether you personally would vote guilty or not guilty. As a juror, you always have that choice to make. That is why we still have juries.
And furthermore, what is “proof” when it comes to people anyhow?
Pretty much everybody knows killing is wrong. There’s still a temporary insanity defense on the books. His being a cop has no bearing on whether he can suffer the same stress-induced psychological dysfunctions as civilians.
He killed him, he meant to kill him, he’s guilty of murder. The issue is the degree of the crime. It was obviously not premeditated, so I wouldn’t vote to convict on a first degree charge. I would have no problem voting to convict on a lesser charge of murder or manslaughter, provided the case was made. Seems that any good defense lawyer would be able to make a case for mental derangement to affect sentencing if nothing else.
Pretty much what I was going to say word for word.
I still suspect that, despite it not happening the way it might in a movie or on TV, the police and DA would find a way to sweep this under the rug.
I think it would be quite easy to prove it. Not only was the accused insane, the victim engineered the insanity. The victim got exactly what he wanted and knew precisely how to get it.
If I had my druthers, I’d rule it a suicide. That’s pretty much what it was.
He was guilty, no two ways about it. Not murder, because not premeditated, but he definitely did it, and there’s no excusing that.
[bolding mine]
I’m not sure what the antecdent of “that” is. If it’s this particular homicide, I think an argument could be made that you’re right (though I disagree). If it’s homicide in general, you’re quite wrong in my view. Certainly there are sometimes excuses and even justifications for homicide. Humans have limits and flaws and frailties, and it is unjust, heartless, and evil to expect people to behave with perfect moral uprightness under extreme circumstances.
Just out of idle curiosity: If Tracy had managed to kill John Doe in self-defense, would that have been excused in your view? Justified? Or just as bad as his kiling her?
All the prosecutor has to do is make his opening statement “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the prosecution will prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the victim in this case who tortured six people to death was shot by the defendant. The prosecution rests.”
Yup. And it’s not like that had happened hours before he shot him, either - it was minutes. John Doe wanted to die, he was guaranteed a life sentence or the death penalty if they had in that state, and he could not have escaped. True revenge would have been not to shoot him but to let him rot in prison before dying horribly with the knowledge that his quest failed. That would have been the sane thing to do.
But Mills had just - a minute or two before, not hours, but minutes - seen his wife’s head in a box. That kind of thing tends to make rational thinking a teensy bit difficult.
In what city did it take place, anyway? I have long suspected that it was Baltimore.
I know we are on a tangent, but the old M’Naughten Rule will not be sufficient, and the Insanity Defense Reform Act of 1984 places the burden is on the defendant to show that
There is an interesting historical review of the insanity law on PBS’s Frontline site
Actually, he didn’t see his wife’s head in the box.
The city is never stated; I’m sure this is deliberate.
ACW is correct that Mills’ never sees Tracy’s head in the box. But John Doe tells him what he’s done, and Somerset functionally verifies Doe’s account by both his demeanor and by not answering the question.
But he knew it was there. That’s even more grounds for considering it temporary insanity - he wasn’t even sane enough to go over and check the box for himself.