This is actually happening so not just a hypothetical:
Personally I think bullies are despicable and Ms. Branham seems worthy of our contempt (assuming the story as related is true).
That said I am hard pressed to see how you can get involuntary manslaughter out of this. I can see wanting to punish the bullies but not sure how you would go about it.
The story says Ms. Branham was not the sole person who tormented this boy. Where should the line be drawn to say she was the proximate cause of his suicide.
Not to mention it seems a heckuva reach to lay a criminal claim on someone when someone else chooses to commit suicide.
Yeah, that’s a reach, particularly given that it’s his boss. Going by the account in that article, it certainly sounds like she played a role, but it also sounds like the kids was taking it from all sides, pretty constantly, for a long time. If she was the primary reason he killed himself, then it seems odd to blame her for him choosing suicide over quitting his job. If (as seems likely) he killed himself because of the aggregation of bullying he’d experienced up to that point, then what’s the justification for choosing this particular person as the one most responsible?
That being said, I admit to some schadenfreude over the idea of this miserable asshole of a Dairy Queen manager shitting her pants that she might be doing hard time for throwing a hamburger at some kid.
IANAL, but to be convicted of manslaughter or homicide, don’t you have to have *physically *caused the death? Hit someone with a car while DUI, accidentally dropped a load of bricks on someone’s head, etc.?
That boss should for sure be charged with something, but manslaughter is too far a stretch in this case.
Also - in another discussion where this came up - having bullies convicted of manslaughter for their victims’ suicide, might perversely incentivize suicide, if the victim knows that suicide could send their bullies to prison.
Yeah, I’m trying to think of something that would be analogous, but more clear cut. Like, say a blackmailer threatens to reveal something shameful about a person, and that person commits suicide - can the blackmailer be charged with their victims death? Or, I dunno, a doctor deliberately giving a misdiagnoses, so someone thinks they have a fatal disease and chooses to end it early?
I would say in the doctor’s case you would have a lie coming from a person you are relying on (so perhaps he has a legal duty to his patient). Neither is the case for this young man.
A blackmailer is committing the crime of blackmail so perhaps there is some way to add this as a result of a crime. But in this case I do not think being mean to someone is a crime.
Don’t get me wrong. I am uncomfortable taking the bully’s side in this. Just not sure how to best hold them accountable.
Not even the site you link makes the claims you do. It specifically lists various reasons for bullying, and being bullied themselves is only one, and quite low on the list. It’s actually quite rare that a bully is a victim.
Plus, this idea that feeling sorry for someone means they shouldn’t be punished for their wrong actions is a dumb one. I feel sympathy for everyone–even forcing myself to do so if I can’t do it naturally. But punishment is still necessary.
If there are no consequences for bullying, the bullying will continue. What happened in the past is in the past. A bully being scared that she might face severe consequences for her bullying is a good thing, no matter how she came into becoming a bully.
Not even bullies, but if someone were in a bad enough place, I could see them killing themself and even framing it on another person. I’m sure that’s been done with murder (that is, killed themself and made it look like they were murdered), but think of how much easier it would be if I could kill myself and write a suicide note explaining all the torment I’ve been getting over the years from [name].
Granted, a case would still have to be made for it, but I’m not talking about the ‘suspect’, I’m talking about the victim.
No, that’s the problem with bullies, they latch on to people that won’t or can’t stand up for themselves and for any number of reasons will just sit there and take it. The really nasty manipulative ones will convince you that you’re the one that will get in trouble if you try to do anything about it (not in a blackmail way, they’ll really have you thinking that) or that what’s happening is actually your fault.
No, in fact there are (multiple, now that I’m trying to find the one that I’m looking for) cases where a getaway driver, who did nothing but sit outside in a car the entire time, is charged with murder while is accomplices go into a store and, while robbing it, end up killing someone (or multiple people). In the case I was looking for, IIRC, the guard killed the robber, so the getaway driver ended up being charged with murdering his friend.
So, not only can you be convicted of murder when you didn’t physically cause it (anymore that I would be could have been said to have caused someones death if I dropped them off at the bank it was held up and they were killed), but there’s a precedent for it.
Not all bad things that happen should result in criminal charges. Being a dick to someone should not be a criminal offense, even if the victim is psychologically on-edge and commits suicide.
If this boss was legitimately being a bad boss in this way, then getting fired and potentially a civil suit for creating a hostile work environment seem like existing reasonable ways to hold them accountable.
We cannot use the criminal code to right every wrong. That way lies madness and a police state.
I am perfectly fine with charging bullies with crimes. If the law needs to be change to accommodate that, then I support changing the law. How hard is it not to bully someone? The bully gains no advantage other than a psychological one. If you are an adult, and are so psychologically damaged that you are incapable of not bullying, then I would be O.K. with you being committed to a psychiatric facility for treatment in lieu of jail. But blaming the victim does nothing. The bully is the one who is responsible, and the one who needs to be stopped, by the police and the courts if necessary.