Naw, once he is out of sight, just report it to the police.
Possibly the use of “he” is ambiguous, here. Picture a husband who comes home from a business trip (or a military deployment, for that matter) and finds out his wife was brutally raped several weeks earlier by someone known to both of them. Almost immediately (i.e. in under an hour), the husband finds and confronts the alleged assailant and kills him. Even though there was immediate danger to the wife at the time the husband gained this knowledge, I can picture evaluating the reasonableness of his belief that his wife was raped (it is possible that if he was relying on her word alone, she was lying or exaggerating) and considering it if I was legally permitted to do so when weighing a verdict on a specific charge. If the legal definition of “First Degree Murder” doesn’t include a “heat of passion” exception, then I’d have to consider the husband’s motivation legally irrelevant.
I gather a lot would come down to the judge’s instructions. Wouldn’t it be his or her responsibility to spell exactly what elements must be satisfied to sustain a guilty verdict on a specific charge?
Nope, not if there was I was 100% sure the rapist actually committed the rape. Maybe I would convict of some lesser included offense, but not murder.
Should read: “Even though there was NO immediate danger to the wife at the time”