Court Opinion

ID: 9758310
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 23:20:34.539647+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:49.266985
License: Public Domain

ROBERTS, Justice,
concurring.
I concur in the result. I agree that the evidence was sufficient to establish that the killing constituted murder of the first degree. I cannot agree, however, with the majority’s statement that “. . . the specific intent to kill is the element which distinguishes murder of the first degree from the lesser grades of murder.”
Under the new Crimes Code, first degree murder is defined as “[a] criminal homicide . . . committed by an intentional killing.” 18 Pa.C.S.A. § 2502(a) (Supp. 1976). Intentional killing is defined as “ [kjilling by means of poison, or by lying in wait, or by any other *177kind of willful, deliberate and premeditated killing.” Id. § 2502(d). Thus, to be guilty of murder of the first degree, the defendant “ 'must not only intend to kill but in addition he must premeditate the killing and deliberate about it.’ ” Commonwealth v. O’Searo, 466 Pa. 224, 242, 352 A.2d 30, 39 (1976) (dissenting opinion of Manderino, J., joined by Roberts, J.), quoting LaFave & Scott, Criminal Law 563-64 (1972).
As Mr. Justice Manderino correctly observed in O’Searo,
“One who possesses the intent to kill may or may not have formed that intent to kill in a willful, deliberate, and premeditated [manner]. If the intent to kill was willful, deliberate, and premeditated, the killing is murder [of] the first degree. If, however, the defendant’s intent to kill was not formulated in a willful, deliberate, and premeditated manner, the killing is not murder [of] the first degree . . ..”
466 Pa. at 242, 352 A.2d at 38-39 (dissenting opinion).
Here, there was ample evidence from which the three judge panel could infer that the killing was “willful, deliberate and premeditated.” Therefore, I agree that judgment of sentence should be affirmed.
MANDERINO, J., joins in this concurring opinion.