Posted on 02/20/2016 6:21:39 AM PST by Citizen Zed
The three teens knew the owner of the house they planned to burglarize that night in 2008 was in the hospital. They had not anticipated that his friend was asleep inside. Awakened by the breaking glass and fearful for his life, the man grabbed a gun from a dresser drawer. When one of the teens opened the bedroom door, the man fired.
The youngest of the three intruders, a slight 14-year-old in a red hoodie named Travis Castle, was killed.
Doyle, then 15, was charged with murder in his friend's death.
Doyle did not pull the trigger and was not even armed. But under a controversial Illinois law known as the felony murder rule, suspects can face murder charges if someone dies during the commission of certain felonies — even if the suspect in the underlying crime does not have a murder weapon or was not immediately present when the death occurred.
In Chicago and elsewhere, the law also has been used to charge crime suspects with murder when a fellow suspect is shot and killed by police.
The felony murder rule, particularly as applied to minors, has no shortage of critics.
(Excerpt) Read more at my.chicagotribune.com ...
The felony murder rule is basic stuff.
I’ve never heard of it being “controversial” in any way.
I have no problem with felony murder charges for that parasite. A conviction would lock him up until he’s an adult criminal. One more murder conviction as an adult, and society would be safer. The problem with our prisons is that we don’t lock up parasites for long enough, and felony murder helps to balance those scales.
This is not a new law, it’s fairly standard across states. Perhaps the “youngsters” shouldn’t have been trying to burgle a house.
Hey, that 14 year old was “slight”.
Now, who could charge such an innocent soul?
The felony murder rule is not unique to IL and isn’t controversial except in those circles who like to burgle and those who like to excuse same.
The key to training and disapline is immediate punishment on discovery of an infraction.
If they don’t have a father or don’t get supervision, this is what happens.
I’d be fine with simply executing anyone who burgles houses.
The author
Has Always been true. More effort to make it ok to participate in crimes even when people get killed.
Three scum break in my home and kill, you think I don’t blame all three?
It’s “controversial” only when it is applied against one of ^Obama’s sons^.
:: Hey, that 14 year old was “slight†::
And, he was wearing [gasp] A HOODIE!
Let me see so if Author’s Muslim friends kill someone all their friends could be charged also is that bad thing
Nothing controversial about it, you start an illegal situation, somebody dies, the death is on you. You don’t have to do the killing, you made the situation.
Sorry, that is funny.
I think it's controversial, and wrong, to charge a criminal for the death of an accomplice at the hands of law enforcement or a person resisting criminals.
The felony murder rule was generally understood as the notion that anyone involved in criminal enterprise is fully responsible for any crime that results. If two people rob a store and the clerk is killed, the accomplice is equally guilty as the person who pulled the trigger.
When the police or a homeowner kill a burglar, the killing was not a crime but a lawful act of self defense, and blaming the accomplice does not make the killing a crime, despite this novel new theory. Jack McCoy, call your office.
I’m 57 years old and this law has not been controversial in all of that time until, apparently, now. Hmmmmm....
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