Opinion ID: 2570523
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 12

Heading: Malice versus specific intent to kill

Text: As a second argument, the State repeatedly invokes and cites authority for the proposition that specific intent to kill is not a necessary element of murder. This proposition, however, does not address this court's concern with jury instruction number 11. The instruction stated that murder committed by means of child abuse is a kind of murder which carries with it conclusive evidence of malice aforethought. (Emphasis added.) Specific intent to kill is not synonymous with malice. The fact that not every murder requires a specific intent to kill does not relieve the State of the burden to prove some kind of malice to establish murder. [11] As the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals explained, the language `murder by poison, lying in wait, imprisonment, starving' does not require that premeditation or a specific intent to kill has to be shown, but to elevate the homicide to first-degree murder, a killing with malice must be proved and one of the four enumerated acts must be established. State v. Harper, 179 W.Va. 24, 365 S.E.2d 69, 72 (1987); see also People v. Benjamin, 52 Cal.App.3d 63, 124 Cal.Rptr. 799, 813 (1975).