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But not for the same crime, and that is key....

I know it's not that simple. If someone gets accused of beating someone to death, they get second-degree murder charges but they don't get assault charges on top of that. I have a feeling the answer lies in the definition of "elements" - it makes sense to me that if assault is included (is an element) of 2nd degree murder, then you can't prosecute for that on top of 2nd degree.

This would seem to imply that a great strategy for prosecutors in this position would be to charge the least serious of all the crimes, and then once a conviction is obtained on the lesser conviction, to go after progressively more serious charges.

What if this victim had died immediately at the time? Could the prosecutor have prosecuted an assault charge, and then after the perp serves his sentence, the prosecutor then prosecutes a second-degree murder charge?