I’m a little bothered by the media making a huge deal of the medical examiner rulings in the recent cop shootings - “HOMICIDE!” the headlines scream.
But… aren’t *all *cop shootings, even the most patently justifiable, “homicide” - death from the actions of another human? Aren’t all deaths caused by the direct actions of another human “homicide” in coroner/ME/death certificate terms, with any criminal intent or charges or terms assigned by the legal system (DA/prosecutor/court)?
Cops belong to the homicide squad, which investigates all human deaths, not specifically “murders” or “manslaughters” or whatever - their job is to look at human deaths possibly caused by other humans and bring the killer and evidence to the legal system for assessment of criminal charges.
“Homicide” =/= “murder” or even “illegal taking of a human life.” It means one human more or less directly caused another human’s death.
Homicide, in both law and common parlance, is defined as an unlawful killing of a human being. If the prevailing law in the applicable jurisdiction has a provision to legally justify the killing, it is not homicide. That rules out things like war, execution, police enforcement, self defense, and a host of other locally designated justifications.
Yea, the word somewhat unfortunately has two related meanings. In everyday speech, it’s specifically an illegal killing. But in the legal system, its just a killing of one human by another, and you can have criminal homicides vs justifiable homicides, etc.
In the case of Eric Garner, the ME’s finding that it was a homicide was relevant, since there was some question whether it was the actions of the cops that caused his death.
But the same finding in the Tamir Rice being widely reported seems to be based on a misunderstanding. he ME’s report isn’t really news, there was never any question as to the cause of death in that case.
Not true. Homicide is only defined as a human killing another human. Nothing about illegal. There is a legal concept of justifiable homicide, as opposed to criminal homicide.
I believe you’ve conflated “homicide” with “murder”. Murder is unlawful; homicide is a factual statement that a death was caused by another human being, and can include the mitigating circumstances you described above.
On a side note, what ever happened to “death by misadventure”?
I’m with ya on this one. The same thought crossed my mind when the headlines start popping.
Obviously, the otherwise healthy 12yo didn’t drop dead from natural causes after being shot.
When someone dies, a death certificate must be completed. Two of the necessary components of a DC are the cause of death and the manner of death. Homicide is a manner of death.
The cause of death is the underlying disease or injury that initiated the chain of events that resulted in the cessation of life sustaining processes. The manner of death categorizes in very broad terms the circumstances in which the cause arose. The choices are dictated by the format of the DC, including only: Natural, accident, homicide, suicide, and undetermined (unable to sufficiently distinguish between two or more of the others).
By itself manner of death is entirely neutral. How the legal system, and other institutions (such as insurance companies), regard the manner of death is up to them. In general these institutions will formulate their own “manner” of death and proceed accordingly. They like it when the DC manner and their manner are congruent, but that is not necessary.
No, they’re not pointless. The headlines are accurately stating that the death was caused by a human being, and particularly, by a police officer. That is a serious issue.
The headlines are making it clear that this was not an accidental death (“death by misadventure”), which is a death that was not caused by an individual (which would be something like a tree falling in a windstorm and killing the person it lands on.)
Still to be decided is whether the homicide in this case amounted to a criminal act, or was justifiable/excusable.
Right, but in 2-1/2 of the three current cases, that was not in doubt. In Ferguson and Cleveland, there is absolutely no doubt that the actions of the officers are what directly caused the deaths of the suspects. So throwing the misunderstood and easily misinterpreted word HOMICIDE! up in the headlines and placing the story prominently is all out of proportion to “a report on the ME’s findings.”
It’s perhaps of more significance in the New York case; the finding is a judgment of the actions and results rather than a simple declaration of them.
No, it means the police officer’s actions caused the death, as opposed to a heart attack or fatal asthma attack etc. It’s not trivial. Whether or not it is illegal is another question, but the ME ruled that it was the officer that killed him.
I already said all of that. Making headline hay out of a story by using a loaded and misunderstood word is sensationalism, and all of these cases have been sensationalized enough - possibly too much.
I disagree. Living in the area there was question if he died by the police’s actions or from some mitigating factor (poor health etc). The fact that it was due to the officer’s actions directly was a huge piece of news which dramatically changed the conversation.
Since the factual aspect of the question in the OP has been answered, and people are expressing their opinions on the motives for the use of the word, let’s move this to GD.
I’m trying to figure out this other plethora of cases where homocide determination isn’t relevant yet publicized. Obviously the Garner case is one that’s been publicized. Which others have there been “homocide” headlines where there wasn’t any doubt? Seriously- I’ve been following many of these cases and haven’t seen what you’re talking about. Can you provide links?
Ambrose Bierce once declared four classifications of homicide: felonious, excusable, justifiable, and praiseworthy. I have some candidates for the latter category.
The first three dictionaries that I checked via onelook; first made no mention of legality, second said illegal, and the third said either legal or illegal.