Title: Watkins v. State

State: maryland

Issuer: Maryland Supreme Court

Document:

Mark Davon Watkins v. State of Maryland
No. 42, Sept. Term, 1999
Felony-murder rule — accomplice liability:
If killing is in furtherance of common felonious enterprise, all co-felons are culpable, even
if person killed was also a co-felon.
Killing committed to eliminate witness is ordinarily in furtherance of the enterprise.
Circuit Court for Prince George’s County
Case No. CT97-1764X
IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF MARYLAND
No. 42
September Term, 1999
______________________________________
MARK DAVON WATKINS
v.
STATE OF MARYLAND
______________________________________
Bell, C.J.
Eldridge
Rodowsky
Raker
Wilner
Cathell
Harrell,
   JJ.
______________________________________
Opinion by Wilner, J.
______________________________________
Filed:   January 11, 2000
The issue presented to us is one of accomplice liability under the felony-murder
doctrine.  The assumed factual predicate from which that issue arises is that three persons
— Jenkins, Hilliard, and petitioner Watkins — conspired to rob a fourth person, Whittington,
that Watkins’s role was to serve as a lookout while Jenkins and Hilliard entered
Whittington’s motel room to commit the robbery, that a struggle ensued between Whittington
and Jenkins, leading Jenkins to shoot Whittington, that Jenkins then shot Hilliard, an alleged
co-felon, in order to leave no witnesses, and that Watkins and Jenkins then made their
escape.  Whittington and Hilliard instantly died of their wounds.  As we shall see, the
assertion that Hilliard was a co-conspirator, and therefore a co-felon, has only the barest
foundation.
Watkins was convicted in the Circuit Court for Prince George’s County, among  other
things, of the felony-murder of both Whittington and Hilliard.  He does not challenge his
conviction for the murder of Whittington but complains that the trial court erred in failing
to give a special foreseeability instruction with respect to the felony-murder charge
concerning Hilliard.  He urges that the deliberate killing of one co-felon by another is not
foreseeable and therefore cannot be regarded as being in furtherance of the common scheme.
Accordingly, he avers, as a third co-felon who had no direct part in that killing, he cannot
be held liable for it under the traditional felony-murder doctrine.  He was entitled, he
maintains, to have the jury consider whether, from his perspective and as a matter of fact,
Jenkins’s killing of Hilliard was reasonably foreseeable.  The Court of Special Appeals
rejected his complaint, Watkins v. State, 125 Md. App. 555, 726 A.2d 795 (1999), and so
shall we.
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BACKGROUND
On Sunday morning, January 5, 1997, the naked  bodies of Whittington and Hilliard
were found dead in Room 160 of the  Motel-6 motel in Camp Springs, Maryland.  Each of
them had been shot in the head at close range.  Whittington was lying face-down on the
floor, between the two beds in the room; Hilliard was face-down on one of the beds, partly
covered by a sheet.  Whittington was known to have a white Cadillac, which, along with the
keys to the car, was missing.  Also missing were some gold rings and a watch that
Whittington was known to wear.  Discovered under one of the beds, however, was $1,156
in cash.  Jenkins’s fingerprints were found on several items in the room.
Three weeks later, Whittington’s car was found in the District of Columbia, about
eight to ten blocks from Watkins’s home.  The car was apparently unlocked, and there was
no sign of tampering.  Watkins’s fingerprints were found on the exterior of the left front
door, and that, eventually, led to his arrest in June, 1997.
The evidence indicated that Whittington and Hilliard were homosexual lovers.
Whittington had frequently stayed at the Motel-6, and testimony was produced that he and
Hilliard had made plans to obtain an apartment together.  On the evening of January 4 —
Watkins said around 8:00 or 9:00 — Hilliard moved his belongings from his mother’s home
into Whittington’s car.  Jenkins and Watkins were observed helping Hilliard put his property
into the car and getting into the back seat of Whittington’s car as it left Hilliard’s mother’s
home.  That was the last public sighting of any of the men prior to the murders.
Upon his arrest, Watkins was interviewed by several Prince George’s County
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detectives, and he gave a series of materially inconsistent and progressively incriminating
statements, some oral and some written.  In his initial, oral statement, Watkins admitted to
Detective McCann that he knew both Hilliard and Whittington, but he denied knowing who
killed them.  He confirmed that Whittington often stayed at the Motel-6 and said that
Whittington and Hilliard were planning to get an apartment together.  He said  that  he had
stayed with Whittington and Hilliard at that motel on Friday night, January 3, that
Whittington had nice diamond rings, and that he was known to “flash money around.”
Watkins later added that he had helped Hilliard move his things into Whittington’s car and
that Jenkins, whom he knew, was present as well.
Upon further questioning  by Detectives McCann and Canales, Watkins made the first
of three written statements.  In that statement, he denied any role in the robbery and murders.
He said that Jenkins had told him on January 4 that he, Jenkins, intended to rob Whittington,
that Jenkins later showed Watkins a watch and rings he had taken from Whittington, and that
Jenkins acknowledged killing both Whittington and Hilliard, stating that “him and
[Whittington] got in a struggle and  he didn’t want to leave no witnesses to the murder, um,
I mean the robbery.”  A short time later, Watkins confirmed orally to Detective Miller that
Jenkins had committed the murders and had killed Hilliard in order not to leave any
witnesses.  In that statement, he added that Jenkins had asked him to be a lookout and that
he had refused.  Watkins said that he had been in Whittington’s car about a week before the
killings.
After further questioning by Detectives Canales and Miller, Watkins gave a second
 Detective Canales later testified that the 7-Eleven store was about a mile away from  the
1
motel and that no reports had been received of hearing any gunshots that night.
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written statement in which, for the first time, he cast Hilliard as a accomplice to the robbery
of Whittington, and not solely a witness.  He said that Hilliard had told Jenkins that
Whittington carried a lot of money and that Jenkins, Hilliard, and Watkins then conspired
to rob Whittington.  Jenkins and Hilliard, he said, drove to the motel with Whittington but,
during the robbery, Whittington struggled and Jenkins shot him and then Hilliard.  Following
the shootings, Jenkins took Whittington’s rings and watch and left the motel in Whittington’s
car.  Watkins said that, although he served as a lookout, he was not at the motel, but waited
at a nearby 7-Eleven store.  In this version, he said that Jenkins called him from the motel
on the evening of January 4, and stated that he was with Whittington and Hilliard.  He asked
Watkins to come to a 7-Eleven store near the motel.  Watkins and another friend, Matt,
obtained a stolen pick-up truck and went to the store to wait for Jenkins, apparently to
provide him with transportation.  At some point, Jenkins drove by the store in Whittington’s
Cadillac.  Matt dropped Watkins at his (Watkins’s) girlfriend’s home. Jenkins came by later,
showed Watkins the jewelry he had taken from Whittington, and told Watkins that “things
got out of hand,” that he had killed Whittington and then killed Hilliard to eliminate
witnesses.  Watkins acknowledged that he knew, when he went to the 7-Eleven, that he was
to be the lookout and was to provide a means of escape for Jenkins.  He did not anticipate
that Jenkins would take Whittington’s car.  In this statement, Watkins said that he waited at
the 7-Eleven store but that he heard gunshots coming from the motel.1
 Watkins presented no defense, other than to challenge some of the State’s evidence.  One
2
of his principal arguments was that the statements he gave were involuntary and should not be
credited.  That issue is not before us.
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Watkins’s final written statement was  more incriminating, but somewhat ambiguous
regarding Hilliard’s role.  He first said that Jenkins announced a day before the killings his
intent to rob both Whittington and Hilliard.  In the same statement, however, he said that he,
Hilliard, and Jenkins “plotted to rob [Whittington].”  Watkins said that Jenkins, Hilliard,
Matt, and he went to the motel, that Watkins waited outside the room as a lookout while
Jenkins and Hilliard went into the room to rob Whittington, that Watkins was standing right
next to the door and could hear what occurred inside, that he heard Jenkins tell Whittington,
“give me the money,” that Whittington struggled with Jenkins, and that Jenkins “started
shooting,” that Jenkins came out with a gun, got into Whittington’s car, and drove away, and
that he then entered the room and saw the victims.
There were, of course, many discrepancies in these various statements, mostly bearing
on the degree of Watkins’s participation, and there were further discrepancies between the
statements and otherwise unchallenged extrinsic evidence.   Watkins and Jenkins were seen
2
by an independent witness, with Hilliard and Whittington, in the back of Whittington’s
Cadillac, heading toward the motel with Hilliard’s property.  As noted, Watkins put this trip
at around 8:00 or 9:00 on the evening of January 4.  Watkins’s first statements indicate that
he did not go to the motel but was called later by Jenkins to come to the 7-Eleven, although
his last statement has the four of them proceeding together to the motel, with Matt following
in a pick-up truck.  Although he wavered as to whether Hilliard —  Whittington’s friend and
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apparent lover, with whom he was about to cohabit — was part of the conspiracy to rob
Whittington, he was consistent throughout that Jenkins had informed him that Hilliard was
killed in order to eliminate any witnesses to the robbery or murder of Whittington.  The
uncontradicted evidence, in other words, was that, whether or not Hilliard was part of the
conspiracy to rob Whittington, he was killed because he was a witness.
Apart from that, Watkins’s statement that Hilliard was part of the conspiracy, that
Hilliard accompanied Jenkins to the motel, and that he entered the room with Jenkins for the
purpose of robbing Whittington, is wholly inconsistent with the unchallenged testimony and
photographic evidence that Hilliard was stark naked, lying face-down on the bed, when his
body was discovered.  In order to find that Hilliard was an accomplice in the manner
described by Watkins in one of his several inconsistent statements, the jury would have to
have found (1) that he accompanied Jenkins to the motel, on the evening of January 4, while
naked, or (2) that he stripped and lay down on the bed after entering the room, while Jenkins
was supposedly struggling with Whittington, or (3) that Jenkins stripped Hilliard before or
after the killings.  The suggestion that Hilliard was an accomplice, in other words, at least
in the manner asserted by Watkins, borders on the preposterous and hinges solely on one of
Watkins’s several inconsistent statements that he contended were involuntary in any event.
The issue now presented to us by Watkins arose initially during the course of
argument on Watkins’s motion for judgment of acquittal.  Relying to a large extent on
Mumford v. State, 19 Md. App. 640, 313 A.2d 563 (1974), he contended that, as Hilliard was
an accomplice in the robbery of Whittington, it was not foreseeable that Jenkins would kill
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Hilliard and that he could not, therefore, be an accomplice to that murder.  Apparently
accepting the State’s argument that, with Watkins’s conflicting statements on the matter,
Hilliard’s status as an accomplice was in dispute and for the jury to resolve, the court denied
the motion.  When dealing then with proposed jury instructions, Watkins requested a
“Mumford type instruction.”  He did not present to the court any particular instruction but
apparently had in mind the kind of instruction that the Court of Special Appeals held should
have been given in Mumford — that, if the jury were to find that Watkins could not have
anticipated that Jenkins would kill Hilliard, it must acquit him of Hilliard’s murder.  The
court refused to so instruct.
The court guided the jury both through instructions from the bench and in the form
of a verdict sheet.  In its instructions, the court told the jury that the State was proceeding
against Watkins on a theory of accomplice liability, that “when two or more persons
participate in a criminal offense, each is responsible for the commission of the offense and
for any other criminal acts done in furtherance of the commission of the offense or the escape
therefrom for each offense committed.”  (Emphasis added).  It emphasized that, in order to
establish liability for other crimes committed during the commission of the principal offense,
the State must establish that Watkins was an aider and abettor in the principal offense and
that “the charged offense was done in furtherance of the commission of the principal offense
or the escape therefrom.”  These general instructions were given more particular focus on
the verdict sheet.  Question 2, directed at the robbery of Whittington, asked whether Watkins
or another participating together and in concert with him robbed Whittington by use of a
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deadly or dangerous weapon.  Question 5, which dealt specifically with the murder of
Hilliard and to which no objection was lodged, asked whether Watkins “or an accomplice
commit[ted] robbery with a deadly or dangerous weapon (see Question 2) and, if so, did
[Watkins] or an accomplice shoot and kill [Hilliard] incidental to or during the course of the
robbery.”   As noted, the jury returned a verdict of guilty in response to that question.
DISCUSSION
As the focus of attention in the trial court (and, to a large extent, in Watkins’s brief
in this Court), was on Mumford v. State, supra, we shall begin there.  Mumford, a 15-year
old girl, and four male confederates broke into a farmhouse for the purpose of stealing what
was there.  While Mumford and one of the boys were rummaging through the unoccupied
house, the other two boys went into a garage located about 30 yards away.  The owner, a 66-
year old woman, returned home and parked her car in the garage while the boys were there.
They grabbed and raped her, and, during the rape, one or both of them strangled her to death.
There was no evidence that Mumford had any knowledge of what occurred in the garage
until informed by the police the next day, but she was nonetheless charged with and
convicted of the felony- murder of the victim, the State’s theory being that the murder arose
from the burglary enterprise in which she was engaged.  She asked for, and was denied, an
instruction that, if the jury were to find that she could not have expected her companions to
commit a rape and that the victim died as a result of a rape, it must find her not guilty of
murder.
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 Relying on a statement from 1 WHARTON, CRIMINAL LAW AND PROCEDURE, § 252,
at 547 (Anderson ed. 1957) that “[t]here is no criminal liability on the part of the others when
the homicide was a fresh and independent product of the mind of one of the confederates,
outside of, or foreign to, the common design,” the Court of Special Appeals held that, under
the felony murder doctrine, there must be a direct causal connection between the homicide
and the felony:  “Something more than mere coincidence in time and place between the two
must be shown; otherwise, the felony-murder rule will not be applicable.”  Mumford v. State,
supra, 19 Md. App. at 644, 313 A.2d at 566.  Noting, then, that there was medical evidence
that the victim’s death ensued from the rape, the court concluded that, had the instructions
as to felony murder “included a requirement of causal nexus between the underlying felony
and the resultant homicide, the jury could have chosen not to believe that death occurred
pursuant to the burglary, but rather from rape, fresh and independent of the common design.”
Id.  For that reason, it reversed the murder conviction against Ms. Mumford.
Mumford was a correct decision, on the facts presented in that case.  When there is
a legitimate dispute over whether the killing was sufficiently in furtherance of the common
enterprise to be chargeable to each of the co-felons, an issue of fact is presented for the jury,
under proper instructions, to resolve.  The question of when such a legitimate dispute is
presented, however, requires some further analysis.
Maryland Code (1996 Repl. Vol.) Article 27, § 410 declares that murder committed
in the perpetration of, or attempt to perpetrate, robbery and certain other enumerated felonies
constitutes murder in the first degree.  Under Maryland common law, a homicide arising in
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the commission of such a felony is murder “whether death was intended or not, the fact that
the person was engaged in such perpetration or attempt being sufficient to supply the element
of malice.”  Jackson v. State, 286 Md. 430, 435, 408 A.2d 711, 715 (1979).  That substituted
form of malice represents, in a way, a vertical extension of the normal requirement that, for
a homicide to constitute murder, the defendant must intend to kill the victim.  It has also long
been established that, under the felony-murder doctrine, a participating felon is guilty of
murder when a homicide has been committed by a co-felon in furtherance of the underlying
felony.  See Campbell v. State, 293 Md. 438, 442, 444 A.2d 1034, 1037 (1982) and cases
cited there.  That extension, which invokes the rule of accomplice liability, is, in essence, a
horizontal one, making culpable other persons, who did not actually commit the homicide
and who may, in fact, have earnestly desired that it not have happened.  The more difficult
issue has been in defining any limits to these two extensions.
We dealt with that issue in Jackson and in Campbell, the broader discussion being in
Campbell.  In Jackson, the defendants, foiled in a robbery attempt, forced the two victims,
as hostages, into a car and fled recklessly from a high-speed police chase.  The tragedy
occurred when a police officer, in an attempt to disarm one of the robbers, accidentally
discharged his shotgun into the car, killing one of the hostages.  The question was whether
the defendants could properly be convicted of the felony-murder of that hostage, when
neither of them fired the fatal shot.  Quoting from 1 WHARTON’S CRIMINAL LAW, § 68
(Anderson ed. 1957), we accepted the basic premise that a person is criminally liable only
for what he or she has caused and that there must be a causal relationship between the
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person’s act and the harm sustained, but we accepted as well the fact that it “is not essential
to the existence of a causal relationship that the ultimate harm which has resulted was
foreseen or intended by the actor,” that the defendant “personally inflict harm upon the
victim,” or that the defendant’s act “be the sole reason for the realization of the harm which
has been sustained by the victim.”  Jackson, supra, 286 Md. at 441-42, 408 A.2d at 718.
Essentially on that basis, we concluded that the victim’s death from the lethal shot of the
officer was legally attributable to the defendants, who put the victim in the position of grave
danger, and that they therefore were properly convicted of felony-murder, although  neither
of them was the direct, immediate cause of his death.  Id. at 443, 408 A.2d at 719.
Campbell also arose from an armed robbery attempt, but there it was one of the
robbers who ended up dead, shot to death either by a police officer or the robbery victim.
The question was whether the killing of the co-felon by a third party in the course of
opposing the robbery or in an attempt to apprehend the perpetrators constitutes first degree
murder on the part of the surviving co-felon.  We held that, ordinarily, it does not.
We began our analysis by recalling, from Jackson v. State, supra, 286 Md. 430, 435,
408 A.2d 711, 715, the basic felony-murder doctrine:  “at common law, homicide arising in
the perpetration of, or attempt to perpetrate, a felony is murder whether death was intended
or not, the fact that the person was engaged in such perpetration or attempt being sufficient
to supply the element of malice.”  Campbell, supra, 293 Md. at 442, 444 A.2d at 1037.  We
noted then the well-established rule that, under the felony-murder doctrine, “a participating
felon is guilty of murder when a homicide has been committed by a co-felon.”  Id.  (emphasis
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added).  We observed, however, that, as to the issue then presented, a majority of the courts
that had considered the question had held that, under the felony-murder doctrine, “a
participating felon is not guilty of murder when the killing is done by a person other than the
participating felon or his co-felons.”  Id. at 443, 444 A.2d at 1037.
The rationale for that approach was the “agency theory” of felony-murder, a “classic
statement” of which appeared in Commonwealth v. Campbell, 89 Mass. 541 (1863).  In that
case, the Massachusetts court confirmed that “a person engaged in the commission of an
unlawful act is legally responsible for all the consequences which may naturally or
necessarily flow from it, and that, if he combines and confederates with others to accomplish
an illegal purpose, he is liable criminaliter for the acts of each and all who participate with
him in the execution of the unlawful design.  As they all act in concert for a common object,
each is the agent of all the others, and the acts done are therefore the acts of each and all.”
Id. at 543.  The Massachusetts court noted, however, that the agency theory carries with it
a limitation,  namely, that “the particular act of one of a party for which his associates and
confederates are to be held liable must be shown to have been done for the furtherance or in
prosecution of the common object and design for which they combined together.”  Id.
Without that limitation, the court observed, “a person might be held responsible for acts
which were not the natural or necessary consequences of the enterprise or undertaking in
which he was engaged, and which he could not either in fact or in law be deemed to have
contemplated or intended.”  Id.
That limitation was also noted in Commonwealth v. Redline, 137 A.2d 472 (Pa. 1958),
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where, applying the agency theory, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court stated:
“The mere coincidence of homicide and felony is not enough to
satisfy the requirements of the felony-murder doctrine.  ‘It is
necessary . . . to show that the conduct causing death was done
in furtherance of the design to commit the felony.’
*  *  *
[I]n order to convict for felony-murder, the killing must have
been done by the defendant or by an accomplice or confederate
or by one acting in furtherance of the felonious undertaking.”
Id. at 476 (emphasis in original) (internal citations omitted). 
Under that approach, which spreads a broad net of accomplice liability for murder
committed by co-felons as a natural or necessary consequence of the joint enterprise, but
which limits that vicarious liability to only those kinds of murder, killings committed by
other persons — law enforcement officers, victims, or bystanders — in an attempt to thwart
or oppose the enterprise do not impose criminal liability on the participating felons because
they are not ordinarily regarded as being in furtherance of the common object, but rather are
in opposition to it.
We observed in Campbell that some courts had used a different theory — the
“proximate cause” theory — to impose liability for homicides committed during the
enterprise by persons other than the co-felons, but, upon review of the decisions, we
determined that the trend had been for the courts to apply the agency theory and limit
culpability under the felony-murder doctrine “to lethal acts committed by the felons
themselves or their accomplices . . . .”  Campbell, supra, 293 Md. at 449, 444 A.2d at 1040.
That is the approach we too adopted.  An extension of the doctrine in accordance with the
“proximate cause” theory, we said, would not further the basic purpose of the doctrine, of
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“deterring felons from killing by holding them strictly responsible for killings they or their
co-felons commit.”  Id. at 450, 444 A.2d at 1040.  Moreover, we concluded that a proximate
cause analysis, which was appropriate for purposes of tort liability, had no proper place in
prosecutions for criminal homicide; it was too broad and comprehensive.  We thus held that,
under the felony-murder doctrine, criminal culpability would continue “for all lethal acts
committed by a felon or an accomplice acting in furtherance of a common design,” but
would not be imposed for “lethal acts of nonfelons that are not committed in furtherance of
a common design.”  Id. at 452, 444 A.2d at 1042 (emphasis added).
Accepting this agency theory and the accompanying  requirement that, to impose
liability on a co-felon under the felony-murder doctrine, the killing have been done in
furtherance of the common object, Watkins conjures up a variety of possible explanations
for why Jenkins may have killed Hilliard other than as part of the common enterprise, none
of which are supported in the least by any evidence in the case, and points then to two cases
and a commentator’s hypothesis as authority for his view that, if properly instructed, the jury
might have found no liability on his part for Hilliard’s murder.  The cases he relies upon are
Rex v. Plummer, Kel. 109, 84 Eng. Rep. 1103 (K.B. 1700) and People v. Sobieskoda, 139
N.E. 558 (1923), supplemented by a reference to 2 W. LAFAVE & A. SCOTT, SUBSTANTIVE
CRIMINAL LAW § 7.5 at 212 (1986).  
The principle established in the two cases and illustrated by LaFave and Scott is that,
if several persons join together in a felonious enterprise and co-felon A, for a wholly
independent purpose of his own, not part of, or in furtherance of, the common scheme and
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not reasonably anticipated by the remaining co-felons, kills co-felon B, the other co-felons
are not liable, under the felony-murder doctrine, for that murder.  In Rex v. Plummer, eight
people joined together to smuggle wool from England to France.  The King’s agents, alerted
to the scheme, attempted to seize the wool as it was being transported toward the sea.  One
of the co-felons fired a shot that hit and killed a co-felon, and the issue arose whether the
other co-felons were chargeable with that murder.  The appellate court considered a number
of possibilities.  If the shot was deliberately fired at the King’s agents and accidentally hit
a co-felon, all would be guilty of felony-murder, for shooting at those agents would have
been in furtherance of the enterprise.  If the shot was fired accidentally, the same result
would ensue.  Only if the shooter fired the shot at the co-felon out of particular malice
directed toward that person would there be no liability, for in that circumstance the murder
would not “be done in prosecution of that unlawful act, but it may be upon another account,
and those who are in the unlawful act, not knowing of the design that killed the other his
companion cannot be guilty of it.”  Id. at 1105.  The killing, said the court, “must be in
pursuance of that unlawful act, and not collateral to it.” Id.
LaFave and Scott’s example, cited by Watkins, is to the same effect.  If A, B, and C
undertake to rob X and, in the process, B accidentally kills either X or C, A is guilty of
felony-murder.  If, however, B, angry at C’s inept manner of assisting in the robbery of X,
intentionally shoots C, “B’s intentional shooting of C is so far removed from the common
plan as not to make A responsible for B’s intent-to-kill murder.”  LAFAVE & SCOTT, supra,
§ 7.5 at 212.  The reason is that “B’s conduct had nothing to do with furthering the robbery,
 Sobieskoda was a split decision.  Judge Cardozo and Judge Crane dissented.
3
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the only connection between the robbery and the shooting being a mere coincidence of time
and place.”  Id.
People v. Sobieskoda, supra, 139 N.E. 558, establishes the same proposition,
although, on the particular facts of that case, we may not have arrived at the same result.3
That case, and later New York cases, have made clear that “[e]ven when the homicide is
committed by one of the persons engaged in the underlying felony, if that person acts for a
private purpose unrelated to the felony, the remaining members of the group are not liable
for the murder.”  People v. Lewis, 444 N.Y.S.2d 1003, 1005-06 (1981) (citing other cases,
including Sobieskoda).
We concur in that view.  It necessarily follows from the agency theory of liability
adopted by us in Campbell and confirmed in State v. Stouffer, 352 Md. 97, 116, 721 A.2d
207, 216 (1998):  there must be some nexus between the killing and the underlying felony.
Mere coincidence between the underlying felony and the killing is not enough; the conduct
causing death must be in furtherance of the design to commit the felony.  Decisions to the
contrary, that impose liability under the felony-murder doctrine for any killing committed
during the commission of the underlying felony as a felony-murder, arise from either a
proximate cause analysis that we have rejected or from a strict liability notion that is equally
inconsistent with an agency theory of culpability.  See, for example, People v. Cabaltero, 87
P.2d 364 (Cal. App. 1939), reviewed and criticized in Norval Morris, The Felon’s
Responsibility for the Lethal Acts of Others, 105 U. PA. L. REV. 50, 71-74 (1956).
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Acceptance of the view that there must be some connection, beyond mere coincidence
of time and place, between the joint undertaking and the killing does not assist Watkins in
this case.  As we have indicated, apart from the exceedingly tenuous evidence that Hillard
was, indeed, a co-felon, the uncontradicted evidence, from Watkins’s own lips, was that
Hilliard, whether or not a co-felon, was killed because he was a witness.  The killing of a
witness, for the purpose of eliminating the person as a witness, is necessarily in furtherance
of the common enterprise, whether the victim is the victim of the underlying felony, an
innocent bystander, or a co-felon whom the actor desires to eliminate as a potential witness.
Actual foreseeability is not the test; there is a range of conduct that the law regards as
implicitly foreseeable, whether or not the prospect of that conduct was ever actually
anticipated.  An accidental killing may not be actually anticipated by all of the co-felons;
resistance by the victim or by others and the killing of a person who resists may not be
actually anticipated by all of the co-felons.  Yet those are consequences that “naturally or
necessarily flow” from the felonious enterprise, and vicarious liability has long existed in
those situations, whether or not the particular co-felon actually anticipated what occurred.
The same is true with respect to the killing of witnesses, as witnesses.
The instructions given in this case fairly and adequately focused the jury on what the
State needed to prove — that the killing of Hilliard was “in furtherance” of the robbery of
Whittington.  That is all that it needed to find in order to convict Watkins of the felony-
murder of Hilliard.
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JUDGMENT OF COURT OF SPECIAL
APPEALS AFFIRMED, WITH COSTS.