Court Opinion

ID: 9670339
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:19:10.674943+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:42:31.930176
License: Public Domain

WUEST, Chief Justice
(special concurrence).
I concur in the majority opinion. Evidence of which girl was driving the pickup was admissible as a part of the transaction or res gestae. Such evidence, however, is not relevant to the defendant’s guilt on charges of second degree murder. Defendant testified that the girls were harassing him to such an extent that he feared for his life and fired the shots to disable their pickup. In addition, the prosecutor conceded in his closing argument that the girls were harassing the defendant. Thus, the issue was whether the defendant killed Tammy Jensen by perpetrating “an act imminently dangerous to others and evincing a depraved mind, regardless of human life, although without any premeditated design to effect the death of any particular individual” (SDCL 22-16-7), and, in so killing her, did not commit justifiable or excusable homicide.