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Murder, Manslaughter, And Justifiable Homicide

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In the United States the degrees by which a person can be charged with killing another person vary; the degrees of murder include first, second, and third degree murder, the definitions of which can vary in legal terms from state to state. These charges are considered to be legally separate from voluntary manslaughter, involuntary manslaughter, and justifiable homicide which each have their own definitions (Cole, Smith, & DeJong, 2014). Each type of murder, manslaughter and homicide is determined by intent and negligible behavior and each will be examined in this paper (Cole et al., 2014).
Murder
First Degree Murder
Murder has not always been defined by degrees by which the act took place, before the separation began, murder of any type was a capital offense punishable by death. The state of Pennsylvania in 1793 was the first state to legally distinguish different degrees of murder, possibly to reduce the amount of murders that resulted in capital punishment (Levinson, 2002). In most states today, first degree murder is commonly defined as the unlawful, willing, and premeditated murder of another human being committed with malice aforethought, which is used to indicate a person intended to kill another person (Berman, n.d.). All states approach murder charges with variations on the same basic principle, intent.
Second Degree Murder
Like all degrees of murder, second degree murder varies from state to state however in general terms it is referred to as the unlawful killing

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