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Comment by cheald | Hacker News Reader

First-degree is premeditated. Third-degree is depraved-heart ("murder as a result of callous disregard for the value of life"). What evidence supports a first-degree charge? If you want him to walk, charge him with first-degree. Good luck proving premeditation beyond a reasonable doubt. The depraved-heart charge is a slam dunk, and is clearly the right one if you actually want justice.

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First degree does require prior intent, but it can be in a very short period of time (minutes, or even seconds). Basically, if you can stop and think about what you're doing at any point and prevent the murder, you can be convicted of 1st degree murder for having carried it through.

I think there could be a pretty compelling 1st degree case there, since the officer had Floyd's neck under his knee for so long. He could have stopped the assault at any point.

I understand that, but the prosecutor would have to prove that Chauvin decided he was going to kill Floyd, rather than that he was heartless and ignored the pleas of a man in distress. The latter is in the bag, done, slam dunk. The former is much harder to prove. If the AG thinks he can prove first, he can always add the charge, but it's just good sense to do the initial charge on the slam dunk offense, especially when they needed to get an arrest and charge on the books to calm the rioters.

In some, murder committed by acts such as strangulation, poisoning, or lying in wait are also treated as first-degree murder.[0]

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder#Degrees_of_murder

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