The felony murder rule has elicited sharp criticisms from legal experts and the public since its first application in the country’s judicial system. According to the rule, a person can be convicted of a murder that occurs in the process of committing a felony even if there is no intention to kill the victim (Seibold, 2017). The felony murder rule also applies when a conspirator in felony crime murders a person in the process of committing a crime or running away from the scenes. Low awareness of the felony murder crime increases the risks of a murder conviction in the country.
The felony murder rule serves an important purpose. First, the rule is expected to act as deterrence against people’s participation in inherently dangerous crimes. Examples of felonies include murder, kidnapping, rape, drug trafficking, and arson, and the risk of murder is exceptionally high in these crimes (Seibold, 2017). Secondly, the law also helps to prevent criminals from murdering witnesses as this would lead to an automatic murder conviction in the courts. Under the felony murder rule, the prosecutor does not have to present overwhelming evidence to convince the court of a criminal’s intent to commit murder; instead, the focus is on providing evidence about the felony crime.
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Factual scenarios of the felony murder rule show that the application of the rule is inherently unjust and unfair. An example is the conviction of Ryan Joseph Holle who loaned his car to a housemate who had the intention to commit a burglary from a drug dealer. During the burglary, a person was killed, and offenders were convicted of first-degree murder (Lerner, 2015). Holle was scented for twenty five years in prison without parole for allowing his car to be used for committing a felony.
References
Lerner, C. S. (2015). Who's Sentenced to Life without Parole-Searching for Ugly Disproportionalities in the American Criminal Justice System. Wis. L. Rev., 789.
Seibold, J. H. (2017). The Felony-Murder Rule: In Search of a Viable Doctrine. The Catholic Lawyer, 23(2), 8.
