Opinion ID: 1722380
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Homicide by Negligent Use of Vehicle.

Text: Before we discuss the issues raised by the defendant we should analyze the nature of the offense under sec. 940.08, Stats. Sec. 940.08, Stats., is the latest in a series of legislative solutions to the problem of fashioning a suitable criminal statute to deal with death caused by conduct which, notwithstanding its accidental nature, the legislature believes to be sufficiently blameworthy to merit punishment as a public offense. [1] The earliest attempt was a statute defining fourth-degree manslaughter, which was held by this court to require only ordinary negligence. Clemens v. State, 176 Wis. 289, 185 N.W. 209 (1922). The court expressed strong misgivings about the wisdom of such a statute, however, and suggested to the legislature that it be amended to require gross negligence. The suggested change was made, and the amended statute was considered by the court in Bussard v. State, 233 Wis. 11, 288 N.W. 187 (1939), a case in which the defendant had, through what appeared to be pure inattention, collided with a stopped vehicle and killed one of its occupants. This court reversed the conviction because the evidence failed to show gross negligence which requires some subjective realization on the part of the defendant. His failure to make any observation during the time it took him to travel approximately four hundred feet indicates quite strongly that the defendant was negligent in a high degree. However, we find no evidence of wantonness or willfulness. (Emphasis supplied.) 233 Wis. at 15. [1] Gross negligence (which is now incorporated in sec. 940.06, Stats., Homicide by Reckless Conduct) requires a subjective intent as an element of the offense. In Bussard and Clemens, the court used the following definition of gross negligence from Jorgenson v. Chicago & N.W. Ry., 153 Wis. 108, 116, 140 N.W. 1088 (1913): . . . Gross negligence has received a very certain and definite meaning in the jurisprudence of this state . . . . It is not inadvertence in any degree; there must be present either wilful intent to injure or that wanton and reckless disregard of the rights of others and the consequences of the act to himself as well as to others which the law deems equivalent to an intent to injure. Shortly after Bussard, in 1941, the legislature enacted sec. 340.271 (2), which provided in part: Any person who, by the operation of any vehicle at an excessive rate of speed or in a careless, reckless or negligent manner constituting or amounting to a high degree of negligence, but not wilfully or wantonly, shall cause the death of another . . . . Though the new statute contained no definition of high degree of negligence, it is apparent that the legislature intended sec. 340.271(2) as a retreat from the subjective standard of gross negligence. Remington and Helstad conclude that sec. 340.271(2) applied to the defendant's conduct the same standard of care as that for ordinary negligence i.e., an objective reasonable person testbut attached liability only where harm to which others are thereby exposed is of a particularly serious probable nature. [2] [2] Sec. 340.271 (2), Stats., remained on the books until the general revision of the criminal code in 1955 [3] which created the present sec. 940.08, Stats. When the legislature enacted sec. 940.08, it created for the first time a statutory definition of high degree of negligence: (2) A high degree of negligence is conduct which demonstrates ordinary negligence to a high degree, consisting of an act which the person should realize creates a situation of unreasonable risk and high probability of death or great bodily harm to another. This definition appears to follow the interpretation of the term suggested by Remington and Helstad. In Osborne v. Montgomery, 203 Wis. 223, 242, 234 N.W. 372 (1931), this court after an extended discussion of the matter, suggested the following instruction to define negligence: Every person is negligent when, without intending to do any wrong, he does such an act or omits to take such a precaution that under the circumstances present he, as an ordinarily prudent person, ought reasonably to foresee that he will thereby expose the interests of another to an unreasonable risk of harm. In determining whether his conduct will subject the interests of another to an unreasonable risk of harm, a person is required to take into account such of the surrounding circumstances as would be taken into account by a reasonably prudent person and possess such knowledge as is possessed by an ordinarily reasonable person and to use such judgment and discretion as is exercised by persons of reasonable intelligence and judgment under the same or similar circumstances. (Emphasis added.) See also Wis. J.I.Criminal 375, Negligence Defined. Thus it is apparent that the statutory definition of a high degree of negligence consists of the standard definition of ordinary negligence with the additional element of a high probability of death or great bodily harm as a result of the culpable act. The high degree of negligence is distinguished not by any different mental state on the part of the actor, but by the existence of a high probability of death or great bodily harm as measured by the objective reasonable person test. The fact that a purely objective standard was intended is confirmed by the comments contained in the Judiciary Committee Report on the Criminal Code (Wisconsin Legislative Council, 1953). [4] [3-5] We conclude that the high degree of negligence standard is an objective one. Paraphrasing Osborne, supra, the state was required to prove that the defendant did an act or failed to take such a precaution that under the circumstances present he, as an ordinarily prudent person, ought reasonably to have foreseen that he was thereby exposing another person to an unreasonable risk and high probability of death or great bodily harm. The scope of evidence properly admissible on this point is, in our opinion, no different than that admissible to prove ordinary negligence when in issue.