I chose something that isn’t assault in my jurisdiction intentionally. I think it can get complicated if you intentionally assault someone and they are injured more than you intended. It might get very fact specific, and also get confusing in terms of what the state has to prove vs. what is sufficient for a jury to find a fact to be proved.
(Incidentally, and to be clear, in my state, “assault” is used in the common parlance way – the crime called assault involves actually injuring someone. Confusingly, at common law – and in some jurisdictions this is still the case – “assault” is a threat of harm, and “battery” is the actual physical attack.)
Just cross-posting this. Charged with attempted first degree murder based (from what I can discern) on threats to shoot up his school and buying a gun, but well before he actually set out to do so.
Apparently, Florida has a law regarding “attempted first-degree murder.” So, you plan to kill someone and take some steps to carry out that plan but fail this law gets you. It requires more effort taken to see the murder through than just “thinking about it.”
I guess it is beyond, “I was just checking out my scope” too.
Florida, like most states, has a murder statute, and an attempt statute. The attempt allegation is added to the elements of the offense that is alleged to have been attempted.
The part of the attempt statute that’s relevant to this discussion is this:
My bold. So in Florida, attempt means intending to commit an offense, and doing "any act toward the commission of " that offense. There may be more in the case law about what counts as an act toward commission of the offense. Like, buying a gun is a much more concrete step than making a list of things you’d need to commit the offense. The latter is more on the side of just thinking about it, and the former is pretty strongly an act toward committing the offense, though less than shooting and missing or being stopped walking into the school.
So what I was explaining is, there is no Florida “attempted first degree murder statute.” There is a murder statute, 782.04, and an attempt statute, 777.04.
Here’s the murder statute. It covers various degrees of murder.
The attempt statute can only be applied to some of the offenses described in the murder statute. For example, Florida includes a death caused by the unlawful distribution of a controlled substance as first-degree murder. Attempt could not apply to that crime, or at least, it would specifically have to be charged as an intentional act – trying but failing to get someone to overdose, perhaps – which would be a very small fraction of the number of cases that could be charged when a death actually occurs.
With a “crime of passion,” it again would come down to the questions, a) did the person specifically intend to kill, and b) did they do a sufficient act toward the commission of the murder, but were stopped or failed?
here’s a news item where a student has been charged with attempted murder in Florida, even though no specific person was targeted, because the police caught him early enough:
Right, and there will be the argument that makes the case law. Surely the law cannot literally(in your bolded part) mean that buying a gun to use it in a later murder counts because even if it is “an act towards the commission” I cannot see how it is an “attempt” (in such attempt does any act toward the commission).
Also note that the person must additionally “fail in the perpetration” or be “intercepted or prevented in the execution thereof.” It seems as if buying a gun and then changing your mind doesn’t count as a failure, an interception, or prevention.
And surely, the act referred to must be something “substantial” like the common law requires. If I am sitting at home thinking of strangling the neighbor, decide to do it, and simply get out of my chair, but then change my mind and sit back down, one could argue that the standing up was “an act toward the commission” of the murder. But what is? Making it to my front door? The porch? The front walk? The neighbor’s porch? Ringing his doorbell? Walking inside? etc.
Case law is all over the place and there is really no hard and fast rule to give a satisfactory answer to the question except to say that it is up to 12 people, using their common sense, to determine if you “attempted” to do what you are accused of doing.
And in the Florida case, I would be arguing that he didn’t try and fail anything. He bought a gun and changed his mind. He didn’t attempt anything. And the prosecutor would get up and argue that the gun purchase was an attempt. Personally, I don’t think it goes nearly far enough. It is “mere preparation” like writing a list or putting gas in the car.