Opinion ID: 2450038
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Second-degree felony murder

Text: The felony-murder rule makes a killing committed in the course of certain felonies murder, without requiring the State to present additional evidence as to the defendant's mental state. See State v. Contreras, 118 Nev. 332, 334, 46 P.3d 661, 662 (2002). The rule takes two forms in Nevada: first-degree felony murder and second-degree felony murder. The Legislature has specified the felonies that provide the malicious intent necessary to characterize a killing as first-degree murder. NRS 200.030(1)(b); Contreras, 118 Nev. at 334, 46 P.3d at 662. In contrast, there are no statutorily enumerated felonies with respect to second-degree felony murder, which is based on the involuntary manslaughter statute (NRS 200.070) and the murder statute (NRS 200.030(2)). Ramirez, 126 Nev. at ____, 235 P.3d at 622; see also Morris, 99 Nev. 109, 659 P.2d 852. When read together, those statutes broadly provide that killings occurring in the commission of an unlawful act that naturally tends to destroy human life or committed in the prosecution of a felonious intent are murder and, unless the murder is committed in a manner that satisfies NRS 200.030(1), are murder of the second degree. Despite that broad language, this court has placed restrictions on the use of the felony-murder rule to establish second-degree murder in order to avoid the potential for untoward prosecutions that a broad application of the felony-murder rule would allow. Morris, 99 Nev. at 118, 659 P.2d at 859. In particular, we have required that two elements [be] satisfied: (1) . . . `the [predicate] felony [must be] inherently dangerous, where death or injury is a directly foreseeable consequence of the illegal act,' and (2) . . . `there [must be] an immediate and direct causal relationshipwithout the intervention of some other source or agencybetween the actions of the defendant and the victim's death.' Ramirez, 126 Nev. at ___, 235 P.3d at 622 (third alteration in original) (quoting Labastida v. State, 115 Nev. 298, 307, 986 P.2d 443, 448-49 (1999)). The question presented by Rose is whether we should further narrow the use of the felony-murder rule to establish second-degree murder by applying the merger doctrine.