I felt the need to address this subject as it seems to be coming up lately. I keep meeting criminal defense attorneys. I am not sure why but it seems to keep happening. I always remember this time in law school when we were studying a case about the “felony murder rule”. Now, the felony murder rule basically steps up a crime to murder if a person dies while a felony is being committed and the defendant is now guilty (allegedly of course) of the murder as well regardless of whether they meant for the person to die or not. (ie: A person wants to rob a store and that is their only intent. Instead, they rob a store and then shoot the store owner. The felony murder rule would be applied.) There are lengthy conversations to be had about the felony murder rule. However,  back to my criminal law class. When we were studying this particular case surrounding the felony murder rule, the issue that a murder was actually committed didn’t seem to matter. Rather, the focus was whether the felony itself was being committed.

For me, I kept wanting to say but wait a minute, a murder happened. Can’t we focus on that for a second. It seemed as if everyone in my class sort of glossed over the idea and they were more interested in hashing out the facts over whether a felony was actually committed. It just seemed so strange. As if everyone was looking at this situation in such a practical way that the murder part sort of passed them by.

When I ask defense attorneys if they like what they do, they always say yes because it gives them a chance to make sure the person is getting a fair shot. I used to always say — but, what if you KNOW the person committed the crime? The general response is always how that is not their job to say but their job is to make sure the person is given their rights just like everyone else. I used to always take such offense to that. I used to think that I could never understand how someone could sit in the same room with a person that they know killed someone but yet fight so hard to make sure their rights are protected.

I know it is a job I could never do but I do have some comfort in knowing that there are people out there making sure others have their rights protected. I am going to interview a defense attorney so this issue should only get more interesting. More to come.