We want to reward “criminal incompetence” because there is a slight chance that it gives criminals an incentive to not successfully complete the murder.
Another reason is that courts tend to punish people for the actual effects of their actions, not the expected effects of their actions. A drunk driver who barrels through a red light gets punished, a drunk driver who barrels through a red light and happens to hit a pedestrian gets punished a lot more, even though the behavior of the drivers is identical. Another example is felony murder, as mentioned by msmith537. Punishing people based on actual results instead of expected results amounts to the same thing, it just makes would-be criminals have to worry about the probabilities, instead of courts worrying about them. Although I believe punishments for attempted murder tend to come close to those for murder.
The main reason is probably based on revenge. I wouldn’t call it a good reason, because in general I don’t think retribution is a good reason for punishment (but that’s another GD). Attempted murder just seems less bad, worthy of a lesser degree of vengeance. For instance, for those who support the death penalty for murderers, how many would support the death penalty for attempted murderers?
Um, yes, I do know what attempted murder is. Not all attempted murders result in injury. If I recall correctly from Criminal Law class, an attempted murder requires the intent to do murder (mens rea) and an act in furtherance of that intent sufficiently likely to bring about the result. So firing your gun at somebody, and missing him, is still attempted murder even if no harm was done.
Here’s a definition of attempt from the law.com dictionary, since I can’t find my copy of Black’s:
people have attempted to address this issue by claiming that the thought and the actions are not equivalent. i agree, but i must add that the intentions and the attempt are also not equivalent. intentions are only thoughts, right? so one may intend to kill someone without actually making an attempt. if that person is prosecuted, hello big brother.
I disagree. The intent is the thought coupled with the action. The criminal took action to take another person’s life.
(I know we all hate it when someone brings up a dictionary definition, but it seems appropriate. American Heritage: intent 2. The state of mind operative at the time of an action)
IMO, a criminal should not get a break soley because his/her victim was lucky (or sometimes unlucky) enough to survive.
>> sailor, The difference is the drunk driver is not proactive. He doesn’t actually do anything. Attempted murder doesn’t punish intent, it punishes action
Gomez, I do not get that. The drunk guy is sitting in the seat of his car attempting to drive the car, except he can’t find the keys. His intent is very clear: to drive 100 miles home. If he finds the keys he will do it. One drunk guy finds the keys and drives, another drunk guys does not find them and doesn;t drive. Their intent is the same, the results different.
This can be answered with a nod to “Moral Luck,” recently explained by Thomas Nagel.
Two men crash their cars into a tree. Unforunately for the second man, there happened to be a child sitting in front of his tree.
If you happen to be a Kantian, both men should be punished equally. If not, then you might say that the second committed murder (or at least manslaughter).
Nagel would say that the second should be punished more severely- not because he is a worse individual, but because he happened to have bad moral luck.
Another example is a comparison between two men growing up in Germany in the 1930s. One man moves to Argentina and becomes a farmer. The other stays and becomes a guard in a concentration camp, where he reluctantly oversees the killing of thousands. Are we to say that the second is a morally inferior man? How can we know what the Argentinian would have done had he stayed?
“Luck” seems to play a large part in evaluations of moral worth.
IANAL but once an intention becomes an action in a chain of actions that will eventually lead to a crime it can be prosecuted as CONSPIRACY to commit whatever. For example, I can think about killing my boss, I can probably even get away with writing up Wile E Coyote style blueprints for how to get him…but if the police pick me up in my car with an anvil, some rope and the blueprints, a case could be made that I am conspiring to commit murder.
Attempted murder is roughly equivalent to murder because the only diference is a bit of luck or incompetance.
Well, not exactly. You’re missing one crucial element; conspiracy requires an agreement between two or more people to commit the crime. You’d need to conspire with someone else (or, in some jurisdictions, with an undercover police officer) to kill your boss, plus generally make an overt act like buy an anvil.