Start Wind Speculation/ All this talk of Rep. Gary Condit and the missing intern got me wondering: What crime does a paid hit man get charged with? /End Wild Speculation. I know that the person that authorizes the hit gets charged with first-degree murder. What happens to the hit man?
My WAG: If the hit man is succesful, than he gets charged with murder as well. If he is arrested before he can kill I think that the charge is conspiracy to commit murder.
Since the murder would be premeditated and non-accidental, the trigger person would also be charged with first degree murder.
I must point out that IANAL, IANAP (Policeman), and IANACK (Contract Killer).
I have heard this refered to as “Murder for Hire” and it may be special circumstances (ie, the death penelty) in some juristictions.
But you see stories of how the hit man rolls over on the person that hired him/her and is charged with a lesser crime.
Not just on TV - this happened in State v. Marshall, a case that got a lot of press in New Jersey. As I recall, Marshall (allegedly?) hired a hitman, who staged a robbery and killed Marshall’s wife at a rest stop on the Garden State Parkway. I believe that the hitman testified against Marshall in exchange for a lighter sentence.
I wouldn’t be surprised if this has happened in other jurisdictions too.
This is called plea bargaining. If the triggerman rolls on the person that hires him, he provides the police with testimony and elements of the crime that they might not be able to get otherwise. He also saves the state the enormous cost of a trial and guarantees the prosecutor a conviction. You see it a lot on TV and it happens in real life all the time. The current Hanssen matter is a perfect example. He will now get life in return for fully disclosing everything he did to the FBI. If he went to trial, received the death penalty (likely), and was executed, we might never have found out just how much he disclosed to his handlers. Sounds like a good deal to me.