Opinion ID: 1119431
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: General Intent v. Specific Intent

Text: 37. Having clarified the proper mens rea for second-degree murder, we now turn to Campos's contention that second-degree murder nevertheless should be analyzed as a specific-intent crime. We explained in Beach that the class of specific-intent crimes encompasses those crimes for which the statutory elements include an intent to do some further act or achieve some additional consequence. Beach, 102 N.M. at 644, 699 P.2d at 117; see also People v. Hood, 1 Cal.3d 444, 82 Cal.Rptr. 618, 462 P.2d 370, 378 (1969) (When the definition [of a crime] refers to defendant's intent to do some further act or achieve additional consequence, the crime is deemed to be one of specific intent.). The remaining crimes that lack this element of further intent comprise the class of general-intent crimes. Thus, a general-intent crime is one for which no additional intent to accomplish a further goal is specified. 38. A crime defined as requiring the mens rea of knowledge, such as second-degree murder, does not require any further intent and therefore does not fall within the class of specific-intent crimes. As the Beach Court properly noted, Second-degree murder ... by statutory definition, [does] not contain an element of intent to do a further act or achieve a further consequence. Id. at 645. Accordingly, as a knowledge crime, second-degree murder is a general-intent crime. The U.S. Supreme Court expressed agreement with this view of knowledge crimes in Sandstrom v. Montana , noting that [t]he element of intent in the criminal law has traditionally been viewed as a bifurcated concept embracing either the specific requirement of purpose or the more general one of knowledge or awareness. Sandstrom v. Montana, 442 U.S. 510, 525-26, 99 S.Ct. 2450, 2460, 61 L.Ed.2d 39 (1979) (emphasis added) (alteration in original) (quoting United States v. United States Gypsum Co., 438 U.S. 422, 445, 98 S.Ct. 2864, 2877, 57 L.Ed.2d 854 (1978)); see also People v. DelGuidice, 199 Colo. 41, 606 P.2d 840, 843 (1979) (Second-degree murder, because it contains the mens rea element `knowingly,' is a general intent crime.). [5] 39. In Garcia this Court further clarified the approach we took in Beach. We considered in Garcia the differences between premeditated first-degree murder and second-degree murder. Garcia, 114 N.M. at 272-73, 837 P.2d at 865-66. We noted, Even though an intentional killing includes the element of knowledge of a strong probability of death or great bodily harm, the converse is not necessarily true; a killing with knowledge of the requisite probability does not necessarily include an intentional killing. Id. Indeed, we pointed out that it is precisely the deliberate intention to cause death that distinguishes premeditated first-degree murder from second-degree murder. Id. at 273, 837 P.2d at 866. It is this deliberate intent to cause death, beyond the defendant's intentional actions, that makes premeditated first-degree murder a specific-intent crime. Similarly, the lack of any additional intent element renders second-degree murder a general-intent crime for which intoxication is not a defense. 40. Furthermore, although Garcia holds that an intentional killing (which lacks premeditation or deliberation) can also be classified as second-degree murder, id., this holding does not justify an intoxication defense. Intoxication would only serve as a defense to the specific-intent aspect of the crime, namely the intentional nature of the killing, but would still leave the defendant guilty of a knowing killing, which is also second-degree murder. Cf. id. at 271, 837 P.2d at 864 (noting that neurological impairment only negates specific intent and therefore is irrelevant to the charge of second-degree murder (citing Beach )).