Homicide

Scenario of an ongoing homicide.

Homicide is the act of causing the death of another person. Legally speaking, it is a crime that consists of killing someone, by action or omission, intentionally or unintentionally, without the the circumstances of treachery, price or cruelty, typical of the murder. It supposes, therefore, an attempt against the life of a natural person, well protected by law.

Etymology

Etymologically, the term comes from the Latin homicidĭum, a compound of homo, “human being”, and caedere, “to kill”, from so that literally in Spanish it translates "to kill a human being".[1]

General classifications

Homicide has five general classifications based on the subjective element of the agent:

• Homicide doloso: Where there is a positive intention to infer the death to the victim. That is, the active subject has the ability to want and understand the consequences of his conduct and produce the result of death.

• Involuntary homicideAlso called Guilty or negligent homicide: when you know the possible result of death and yet you think you can avoid it, but it fails and it occurs. It also occurs when the result is definitely ignored, but it is also killed. Puncture in this case is protected by the duty of every person to refrain from harming another, and actions without intent and omissions that result in death are likely to be judged in accordance with criminal laws.

• Preterm murder: It mentions the overflowing of the intentions of the causator, in which it was originally intended to be damaged, but unfortunately it was killed. For example, if you just want to hit someone to cause bruises, and you end up killing them. It has been claimed that pre-terminal homicide is a midpoint between dolo and guilt; it hurts against action and blames against the result.

• Single homicide: One who commits himself in the absence of the four aggravators, who are premeditation, alevosy, advantage and betrayal.

• Qualified homicide: It is an offence whose action is constituted by the death that one person causes to another intentionally, carried out under certain specific circumstances, related to the means employed or the mode of perpetration.

There are various aggravating factors for homicide depending on the relationship between the murderer and his victim; for example, killing the spouse becomes uxoricide (if the wife or girlfriend is killed) or mariticide (if the husband or boyfriend is killed); to blood relatives in a straight line ascending or descending, it is parricide; assassination if the victim was the highest representative of the State; genocide if issues of an ethnic, racial or religious nature mediated to carry out the act. It should be noted that all these kinds of homicides can have different legal consequences.

Qualified homicides

In turn, the classification of homicides is subdivided into:

• Aggravation or aggravation in those circumstances that will make the penalty more extensive:
  1. Because of the link between the author and the victim: parricide.
  2. Because of the author ' s choice to commit it: ravages, spidering, serious sevicias or poison.
  3. Because of the cause:
     • Pay or pay.
     • Homicide crimini causes.
  4. Made with an ideal means to create a common danger: (incend, flooding, derailing, etc.)
  5. Because of the number of people.
• Qualified by attenuation or attenuation:
  1. Murder committed under violent emotion or emotional homicide.
  2. Preterm murder.

Increased penalties through aggravating circumstances:

• 1. Premeditation: Consists in performing prior to the commission of the murder, certain behaviors tending to prepare it; for example, studying the victim, his movements, fears, state of health, causing a fire, causing a flood.
• 2. Alevosía: It is uphill when some means are used to decrease or end the defense that the victim can offer, for example, by ambusing it, by blinding it.
• 3. Advantage: This is qualified when the aggressor is not at risk of being damaged by his victim, due to the quality of his weapons, the training he has with them, their size or physical constitution or standing (and the victim is unarmed or fallen). It is not the same as a 22-caliber gun than an AK-47 assault rifle, or a karatec against an armed person with a hand razor, for example. It should be noted that there is no advantage if the victim is standing, has better weapons, better training or has a better physical condition.
• 4. Betrayal: It happens when, in addition to the harassment, the trust that the victim has placed in his aggressor is used; for example, the boyfriend or girlfriend of a person, a family member or a friend.

Homicide and Murder

When the homicide consists of killing a person incurring in certain specific circumstances, dependent on the legislator, such as treachery, price, reward, promise, cruelty or premeditation, deliberately and inhumanly increasing the pain of the offended, it is also called murder. It's a type of qualified homicide. Murder is considered when a person causes the death of another and carries it out with one of the three assumptions (or all three together) of 'treachery' (it is carried out treasonously and/or when it is known that the victim will not be able to defend themselves), 'cruelty' (deliberately and inhumanly increasing the suffering of the victim) or 'competition for a price' (committing the crime in exchange for economic or material retribution).

While homicide is the crime that someone commits to end the life of a person, murder requires a greater number of requirements.

Although the subject has been widely discussed, the murder is not a simple aggravated homicide, but a different crime (according to most of the doctrine and jurisprudence), in which the circumstances indicated are elements constituents thereof. In the murder there is a greater intensity of the criminal purpose than in the homicide, always having a subject and by the harmful means used in a special way or by the unmistakable malice and dangerousness that is revealed, and the plans and strategies to subsequently consummate the crimes. murder victims.

There is, however, jurisprudential and doctrinal matter to the contrary, which reflects the discussions that this topic still raises today. Among the reasons for considering it an aggravated homicide, two stand out:

• Its separate regulation of murder.
• It is considered murder when one person causes death to another, but in crime none of the three cases cited in the section concerning murder are contemplated. It may be intended to kill someone but not to get discouraged, or to do it carefully or under reward, so it would be said that a ‘homicide’ has been committed, although we do not usually see it accompanied by the term ‘dollar’.
• Considering aggravated murder would not break imputation title unit in the event that there was participation in the crime and the participants did not know that the author acted for one of the cases or requirements required for the crime. The perpetrator could thus be punished as a crime of murder and the participants as perpetrators of a crime of murder.

For all these reasons, there is no such thing as reckless murder, but rather it always involves intentionality.

Involuntary manslaughter

Wrongful homicide may be excluded from criminal liability if it was carried out in legitimate defense, prevention of a more serious crime (state of necessity), compliance with an order from a superior command, or due to a legal duty.

Homicide by violent emotion

The existence of the emotion is the step towards the excuse, because it is considered in itself by the Law as a state in which the subject acts with a decrease in the power of the inhibitory brakes of the will. The passage from the exemption to the mitigation of the sentence of the homicide committed by violent emotion, with respect to the simple homicide implies, on the one hand, the recognition of the prohibition to kill. The cultural principle of "not killing" is excused with the social argument of killing a prisoner of intense emotion and is judged in the same way, since the law is benign before heated heads and excited hearts.

Difference between culpable and intentional homicide

It is important to keep in mind that homicide exists when an individual takes the life of another.

The main difference between culpable homicide and intentional homicide is:

If the murderer has the intention or intention of ending the life of another human being, it is called intentional homicide.

However, when the death is the result of a reckless or negligent action (traffic accidents, medical negligence) then it is a negligent or reckless homicide.

Another difference between intentional homicide and culpable homicide is in the intentionality of the homicide; that is, if his intention was to kill or not.

Obviously, it is not as serious to take the life of another person on purpose, as when it happens due to a reckless action due to not being careful.

Subjects

Within homicide we find two types of subjects:

• Active subject: It is the one who executes the conduct of action or omission, to produce the result of death; that is, the murderer.
• Passive subject: He is the holder of the "life" legal good. It is different from the victim who contemplates both the passive subject and the other persons who were affected by the commission of the crime.

Conduct

Homicide is considered a conduct, and we can classify it as conduct of action when the active subject makes the necessary bodily movements to produce the result of the death of the passive subject, and conduct of omission or improper omission, in which the subject asset stops doing what was expected of him as guardian of a life and due to this the death of the passive subject occurs as a result.

For example, a mother who stops feeding her child, resulting in the child's death, would be a case of manslaughter, since the mother is responsible for keeping an individual alive who cannot do so itself.

History

This crime, being voluntary, carried the death penalty among Jews. in chap. XXI of Exodus, in the XXXV of Numbers, in the XIX of Deuteronomy and in the XXI of the same book, various laws concerning voluntary and involuntary homicide are read. In addition, Jesus Christ by Saint Matthew in chap. V. says: whoever kills will be sentenced to death in court. Lately, by cap. XXII of Revelation, we see that murderers will not enter the kingdom of God.

In Attica there was a court called Phreattis, which dealt with homicides. In general, he only judged those who, accused of murder in their country, had escaped or those who, having committed an involuntary manslaughter, had later become guilty of another premeditated one. The judges met near the sea beach and the defendant, without allowing him to disembark, defended his cause from a boat. If he was found guilty, he was left to the mercy of the waves and the winds. Teucer was the first to justify himself in this way, proving that he was innocent of the death of Ajax.

In Athens, involuntary manslaughter was punishable by one year of banishment. Voluntary manslaughter was punishable by life but the culprit was left free to flee before the sentence was pronounced and in this case they were content to confiscate his property and endow him with his head. For this crime there were three courts in Athens:

• the Areopago for premeditated death.
• the Palladium for the involuntary.
• the Epidelfinium for those killers who intended to have done it legitimately.

In ancient times it was often enough to make a few atonements to save oneself or be acquitted of a homicide.

In Rome, the first laws made by Numa condemned murderers to death. Tulio Hostilio made another law to punish the murderers on the occasion of the death committed by one of the Horatii. Through it, he provided that the decemviros would be the judges of this class of crimes, from whose sentence the accused could appeal to the people: but if the sentence was approved or confirmed, the culprit was hanged from a tree, after having been whipped, in the city or out of it. By the law Cornelia de Sicariis decreed by Lucio Cornelio Sulla, being dictator in the year 673 of Rome, he established some distinctions: if the culprit was an illustrious or rich man, he was punished with banishment, if he was an ordinary man's head was cut off and if a slave, he was crucified or made to fight against ferocious beasts. Later, with time, this injustice was repaired, indiscriminately condemning all murderers to death.

By the Council of Trent it was decided that the voluntary murderer should never be ordered and that the involuntary or casual murder could only be done when there were very urgent reasons and after the prayers had been approved.

Regulation by country

Argentina

Homicide is penalized in the Penal Code of the Argentine Nation in articles 79 to 84.

The homicide is aggravated:

• For the connection with the victim. Killing a direct family member, spouse or partner, even if there is no coexistence.

• By the way you commit it. Kill with:
  • Insanction, which means to voluntarily and inhumanly increase the suffering of the victim.
  • Alevosía, which means acting on treason and on insurance.
  • Poison or other insidious procedure. Insidiousness occurs when the means employed make it more difficult for the victim to prevent, prevent, defend the perpetrator.

• For price or rewarding promise. Kill someone else in exchange for a payment.

• By racial, religious, gender or sexual hatred.

• By the means employed. The code aggravates killing another with a means that can create a common danger. For example a bomb, a fire, etc.

• Kill another with the premeditated contest of 2 or more people. Which means the one who kills agrees with 2 or more people to commit murder. Must be at least 3 people.

• Homicide crimini causes. Kill to prepare, facilitate, commit or hide another crime.

• Murder of a member of the security forces.

• Homicide by a member of the security forces, abusing his post.

• Homicide of a military superior.

• Femicide. When the act is perpetrated by a man against a woman and mediates gender-based violence. [2]

• For cross-revenge. Also called Femicide Vinculado. Killing someone to cause suffering to another person with whom he or she has maintained a relationship.

There are two cases of homicide where the penalty is reduced, that is, a lesser penalty is applied:

• Homicide produced in a state of violent emotion. Violent emotion is a psychic state and the spirit of the author that generates a shock because of an offense to his feelings by the victim or a third party. It affects your faculty to control yourself, may be anger, irritation, fear, pain, passion state etc.
• Preterm murder. It is the case of one who has the will to cause harm in the body or in the health of a person and, without want, kills it; but the means used to produce the damage should not reasonably cause death.

Ecuador

In Ecuador it is regulated in article 140 of the Comprehensive Criminal Procedure Code, second chapter "Crimes against the rights of freedom" first section.

In Ecuador, according to the regulations of the comprehensive criminal procedure code, it is called murder when one person kills another, thus having a sanction with a custodial sentence of twenty-two to twenty-six years, if any of the following circumstances:

1. Knowingly, the offender has killed his ascendant, descendant, spouse, cohabitant, sister or brother.
2. Place the victim in a situation of helplessness, inferiority or take advantage of this situation.
3. By flooding, poisoning, fire or any other means that endangers the life or health of others.
4. Search for that purpose, night or depopulated.
5. Use means or means capable of causing great havoc.
6. To deliberately and inhumanly increase the pain to the victim.
7. Prepare, facilitate, consummate or conceal another violation.
8. Ensuring the results or impunity of another offence.
9. If death occurs during mass concentrations, tumult, popular shock, sporting event or public calamity.
10. Perpetrate the act against a dignitary or candidate for popular election, elements of the Armed Forces or the National Police, prosecutors, judges or members of the Judicial Service for matters related to their functions or protected witness.

Spain

Homicide, according to the Spanish Penal Code in force in 1995, is a crime that violates the legal right independent human life. It is regulated in article 138: "Anyone who kills another will be punished, as guilty of homicide, with a prison sentence of ten to fifteen years".

The figure contained in article 138 provision is eminently fraudulent. Homicide committed due to serious negligence is included in article 142 (as well as reckless homicide with weapons or motor vehicles and homicide due to professional negligence).

It is necessary to point out that preterintentional homicide is not included in Spanish law; applying, in most cases, an ideal contest of crimes between the homicide and the criminal figure in question. Nor are there other specific figures such as parricide or uxoricide, since in Spanish criminal law the punishment is based on the violation of the legal right and the fact of killing one person or another is not punished. For these cases, the mixed kinship circumstance of article 23 of the Penal Code could be used as an aggravating circumstance.

The figure of murder is found within the title of the Penal Code: "Of homicide and its forms", in article 139. It takes place when any of these requirements concur in the crime of homicide:

• Alevosía: it consists of the use of means, modes or forms in the execution that they store directly and especially to ensure it, without risk to the aggressor who proceeds from the defense that the victim might do or with the conscious search for the crime to go unpunished. These are cases of alevosy in which the particular situation of devaluation and defenselessness of the assault is taken advantage of, when the execution is sudden and unexpected, by surprise, or when it is done by stalking, betting, trap, ambush or celada. It can also be nocturnity or disguise, which prevent the recognition of the perpetrator of the crime.
• Price, Reward or Promise: this circumstance has an inescapably economic character. It is an ancient expression, but that the Spanish legislator has wanted to maintain it because there is a profuse jurisprudence in application of it. It is not necessary that the economic contracting be prior to the commission of the criminal act, nor that it be verified objectively (stop cases of fraud). The important thing is that the active subject commits the act moved by this economic intentions.

• Insanction: this is, deliberately and cruelly increasing the pain of the victim. The damage is appreciated both by intention and by the objective of increasing the pain of the assault, and therefore excludes acts performed on the body after the death of the victim (which could constitute another different offence, such as the desecration of the body). It is a doctrine of the Supreme Court that should not be confused with "animo decided to kill".
• Following the latest reform of the Spanish Criminal Code, which had been in force since 1 July 2015, another act was included that converted homicide into murder, which was carried out to facilitate the commission of another offence or to prevent it from being discovered.

Article 123 of the Penal Code, Decree Number 17-73 Homicide: whoever kills someone commits homicide. The murderer will be imprisoned for a maximum of 15 to 40 years.

United States

Murder in California is defined as "the unlawful killing of a human being or fetus with premeditated malice. Malice foresight can be defined simply as: you wanted to kill the victim. Malice refers to when:

• The murder was an intentional act.
• The action carried out has natural consequences that are known to be dangerous to human life.
• The action was carried out deliberately and with a conscious contempt for human life.

There are three levels of severity for murder in California: first-degree murder, second-degree murder, and capital murder.

A person convicted of first degree murder in California will face a sentence of 25 years to life in prison. They must serve at least 25 years in detention before being eligible for parole. If the murder was committed because of the victim's race, religion, or gender, those convicted will be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

A person convicted of second-degree murder in California will face a sentence of 15 years to life in prison. They must serve a sentence of 15 years in prison before being eligible for parole. The punishments are much more severe if the murder victim was a peace officer or was killed during a shootout.

If a person is convicted of capital murder, they can face a sentence of life in prison without parole or the death penalty.

If a weapon was used during the murder, the punishment will include an additional 10, 20, or 25 years in prison. Those convicted will also receive penalties and fines of up to $10,000. They will also have to pay restitution to the victims, and they will no longer be allowed to have a gun.

Peru

Homicide, in the Penal Code of Peru, is typified under Title I-Crimes against life, body and health. Specifically, in articles 106 to 108-A: "Anyone who kills another will be punished with a custodial sentence of not less than six nor more than twenty years". Its current configuration is as follows:

• Single homicide (art. 106).
• Parricidio (art. 107).
• Murder (art. 108).
• Qualified homicide of officials and authorities (art. 108A).
• Femicide (art. 108B).
• Sicariato (art. 108C).
• Peripheral offences to sicariate (article 108D).
• Murder for violent emotion (art. 109).
• Infanticide (art. 110).
• Guild homicide (art. 111).
• Homicide for piety (art. 112).
• Instigation or assistance to suicide (art. 113).

Venezuelan

The crime of homicide in all its modalities is typified in the Venezuelan Penal Code, in the following terms:

Simple Homicide Article 405. Whoever has intentionally killed someone will be punished with imprisonment from twelve to eighteen years.

Qualified Homicide Article 406. In the cases listed below, the following penalties will be applied:

1. Fifteen years to twenty years in prison for anyone who commits homicide by means of poison or fire, submersion or another of the crimes provided for in Title VII of this book, with treachery or for futile or ignoble reasons, or in the course of the execution of the crimes provided for in articles 449, 450, 451, 453, 456 and 458 of this Code. 2. Twenty years to twenty-six years in prison if two or more of the circumstances indicated in the preceding numeral concur in the act. 3. From twenty-eight to thirty years in prison for those who perpetrate it:

a. In the person of your ancestor or descendant or your spouse. b. In the person of the President of the Republic or whoever temporarily exercises the functions of said position.

Single paragraph: Those who are involved in any of the cases expressed in the previous numerals, will not have the right to enjoy the legal procedural benefits or the application of alternative measures of the execution of the sentence.

Aggravated Homicide Article 407. The penalty for the offense provided for in article 405 of this Code will be from twenty to twenty-five years in prison: 1. For those who perpetrate it in the person of their brother. 2. For those who commit it in the person of the Executive Vice President of the Republic, of any of the Magistrates or Magistrates of the Supreme Court of Justice, of a Minister of the Office, of a State Governor, of a deputy of the Assembly National, of the Metropolitan Mayor, of the Mayors, or of a rector of the National Electoral Council, or of the Ombudsman, or of the Attorney General, or of the Attorney General or of the Comptroller General of the Republic, or of any member of the High Command of the Military, of the Police, or of some other public official, provided that with respect to the latter the crime was committed because of their functions.

Single paragraph: Those who are involved in any of the cases expressed in the previous numerals will not have the right to enjoy the procedural benefits of the law or to the application of alternative measures to serve the sentence.

Wrongful Homicide Article 408. In the cases provided for in the preceding articles, when the death has not occurred without the help of unknown pre-existing circumstances of the accused, or unforeseen causes that have not depended on his act, the penalty shall be imprisonment from seven to ten. years, in the case of article 405; from ten to fifteen years, in article 406; and from eight to twelve years in that of article 407.

Wrongful Homicide Article 409. Whoever, due to having acted imprudently or negligently, or with lack of skill in his profession, art or industry, or due to non-observance of regulations, orders and instructions, has caused the death of any person, shall be punished with imprisonment for six months to five years. In the application of this penalty, the courts of justice will assess the degree of guilt of the agent. If the fact results in the death of several people or the death of a single person and the injury of one or more, provided that the injuries entail the consequences provided for in article 414, the prison sentence may be increased up to eight years.

Preterintentional homicide Article 410. Whoever, with acts aimed at causing personal injury, causes the death of someone, will be punished with imprisonment for six to eight years, in the case of article 405; from eight to twelve years, in the case of article 406; and from seven to ten years, in the case of article 407. If the death had not occurred without the concurrence of unknown pre-existing circumstances of the culprit, or of unforeseen or independent causes of the culprit, the penalty will be imprisonment from four to six years, in the case of article 405; from six to nine years, in the case of article 406; and from five to seven years, in the case of article 407.

Homicides

• Consensual homicide (see Eutanasia)
• Guilty homicide
• Homicide doloso
• Vehicle homicide
• Crime of honour
• Homicide for rape
• Murder
  • Ritual murder
    • Human sacrifice
  • Mandate murder
  • Murder with torture
  • Widening
  • Sexual murder
  • Mass murder
  • Serial murder

By type of victim:

• Deicide
• Democide
• Feticide
• Femicide
• Genocide
• Infanticide
• Magnicidio
• Pogromo
• Regime
• Suicide
• Uxoricidio

Family homicides

• Avunculicidiomurder of uncle (see Avunculicide).
• Guilty, murder of son.
• Fratricidio, brother murder.
• Marriage, mother murder.
• Mariticidehomicide of the husband (see:Mariticide).
• Nepalidhomicide of grandson (see:Nepoticide).
• Parricide, murder of parents or close relatives.
• Patricidemurder of the father (see: Patricide).
• Prosecutionhomicide of descendants (see:Prolicide).
• Sisterhood, sister homicide.
• Uxoricidio, murder of the wife.