Court Opinion

ID: 9648279
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 14:12:33.698726+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:58.268004
License: Public Domain

VANCE, Justice,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. The appellant requested an instruction on second-degree manslaughter and objected to the failure of the court to give it. I believe he was entitled to such an instruction.
Esther Stewart died from a stab wound inflicted upon her during the course of the robbery. Appellant denied that he stabbed Mrs. Stewart but admitted to police investigators that he stood outside as a lookout while another man committed the robbery. Other witnesses testified that appellant admitted to them his involvement in the crime and stated that when he asked the woman for money she screamed, and he then hit her with his gun and stabbed her to stop her from screaming.
A detective testified that appellant stated that he was in the store when the robbery occurred but that nobody was supposed to get killed.
The appellant was convicted of intentional murder. Intentional murder requires a specific intent to cause death. K.R.S. 507.-020. A specific intent to cause death may be inferred from the circumstances, and the circumstances in this case were sufficient to warrant the jury to believe that appellant committed the robbery and stabbed Esther Stewart with an intent to kill her.
In view of appellant’s statement that nobody was supposed to get killed and that he stabbed Mrs. Stewart to stop her from screaming, the juiy might have believed that he stabbed Mrs. Stewart, but nevertheless have had a reasonable doubt as to whether or not he intended the stabbing to cause her death. If such a doubt existed in a juror’s mind, but yet there was no doubt that appellant was aware of and consciously disregarded a substantial risk that death might result from the stabbing, he could reasonably have been found guilty of second-degree manslaughter by wantonly causing the death of another person.
Because the evidence was such that the jury could have had a reasonable doubt that appellant intended to kill Mrs. Stewart, yet not have doubted that he was aware of an unjustifiable risk that his act would cause the death of Mrs. Stewart, he was entitled to an instruction on second-degree manslaughter, a lesser included offense of the offense of murder.
LAMBERT, J., joins in this dissenting opinion.