Analysis of Tison case majority opinion and intent-to-kill doctrine

4.2.12 WC: 191694 The majority opinion began its analysis with the following acknowledgment: Petitioners argue strenuously that they did not "intend to kill" as that concept has been generally understood in the common law. We accept this as true. Traditionally, "one intends certain consequences when he desires that his acts cause those consequences or knows that those consequences are substantially certain to result from his acts."... As petitioners point out, there is no evidence that either Ricky or Raymond Tison took any act which he desired to, or was substantially certain would, cause death.*° When I read these words, I thought that we had surely won. That was precisely what I had argued. The Court had accepted my argument in full. It should have followed from this acceptance that, in the words of one of the justices, “that’s the end of the case.” But it was only the beginning. Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, who had dissented in Enmund but was now writing the majority opinion in the Tison case, then expressed dissatisfaction with the rule that had been established in Enmund: A narrow focus on the question of whether or not a given defendant "intended to kill," however, is a highly unsatisfactory means of definitively distinguishing the most culpable and dangerous of murderers. Many who intend to, and do, kill are not criminally liable at all — those who act in self defense or with other justification or excuse. Other intentional homicides, though criminal, are often felt undeserving of the death penalty — those that are the result of provocation. On the other hand, some nonintentional murderers may be among the most dangerous and inhumane of all — the person who tortures another not caring whether the victim lives or dies, or the robber who shoots someone in the course of the robbery, utterly indifferent to the fact that the desire to rob may have the unintended consequence of killing the victim as well as taking the victim's property. This reckless indifference to the value of human life may be every bit as shocking to the moral sense as an "intent to kill." °° The court then elaborated on its reasoning: The Arizona Supreme Court did not attempt to argue that the facts of this case supported an inference of "intent" in the traditional sense. Instead, the Arizona Supreme Court attempted to reformulate "intent to kill" as a species of foreseeability. The Arizona Supreme Court wrote: "Intend [sic] to kill includes the situation in which the defendant intended, contemplated, or anticipated that lethal force would or might be used or that life would or might be taken in accomplishing the underlying felony." This definition of intent is broader than that described by the Enmund Court. Participants in violent felonies like armed robberies can frequently "anticipat[e] that lethal force... might be used... in accomplishing the underlying felony." Enmund himself may well have so anticipated. Indeed, the possibility of bloodshed is inherent in the commission of any violent felony and this possibility is generally foreseeable and foreseen; it is one principal reason that felons arm themselves. The Arizona Supreme Court's attempted reformulation of intent to kill amounts to little more than a restatement of the felony-murder rule itself. Petitioners do not fall within the "intent to kill" category of felony murderers for which Enmund explicitly finds the death penalty permissible under the Eighth Amendment. 176 HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_017263