How to distinguish between Homicide and Murder

First, let’s talk murder. The word itself sends shivers down one’s spine of excitement or nervousness or maybe both. Murder basically refers to the intentional killing of one human being by another. The prefix ‘intentional’ is to be noted specially as it serves as one of the major marks of differentiation between murder and homicide. The legal jargon used in this scenario is a killing that was committed with ‘malice aforethought’. However, this does not in any way mean that malice is a necessary factor for a murder to take place. For any killing to be classified as a murder, there ideally must be an intent to kill or at least a conduct that is so reckless that it can be considered as murder. Now with Homicide, the story is a little different. Agatha Christie once said, “Everyone is a murderer. In everyone there arises from time to time the wish to kill although not the will to kill”. And that is essentially what differentiates a murder from a homicide. The word ‘homicide’ comes from Latin in which ‘homo’ means ‘man’ and ‘cide’ means to ‘cut’. Thus, a homicide is basically a killing that may be classified as legal if the situations justify it. Homicides can also be considered illegal and in such an instance it is treated as a murder. Therefore, to put it simply, All murder may be homicide but not all homicide is murder.

Now that the basic distinctions between the two types of killings are clear, the next step is to look at the way in which they are classified. Considering that all murders are intentional and therefore must be planned, murder is illegal and a crime. On this basis, Murders are classified into three types for ease of jurisprudence. First degree murders are basically those where the accused takes part in killing a person of the vulnerable category as in the case of children or in the case when he/she unintentionally and by accident kills someone while committing another crime. First degree murders usually include ‘premeditated killings’, i.e., any killing that required even the tiny-est of planning and implementation. Second degree murders on the other hand include all those killings that are not premeditated as these killings show that the accused showed a horrifying indifference to the sanctity of human life and also to the welfare of others. A third type of murder is what is known as felony murder which is basically a killing that happens while committing another crime which is categorized as a felony. The punishment for a first-degree murder can go up to 25 years while second degree murders can get up to 15 years in prison.

It must be noted that certain medical deaths can also be termed as homicide when it involves reckless endangerment, manslaughter or willful neglegence. When a death of a patient is intentionally caused by the doctor, or the treatment meted out is by a fraud individual and in cases of extreme negligence that leads to death can all come under the reckless homicide category. Legal issues in the medical field one is not just limited to negligence in treatment. Sometimes, adverse side effects of prescribing controversial medicines like Pradaxa can lead to deaths. It is in such cases when you have to take legal counsel in order to safeguard your health interests.

Homicide as compared to murders may be classified both as legal and illegal. For instance, soldiers killing the enemy in battle is in essence killing but it is deemed justified by law and hence considered to be legal homicide. Similarly, in the frequent case that someone finds an intruder inside their home and kills him, it will not be considered a crime but rather an action taken in self defence. In all such cases, the law is almost always on the side of the accused. Usually plaintiff law firms would have a tough time winning their case if on the side of the victim. However, there are a few award-winning law firms like Schmidt & Clark that have a good record in handling tough cases and lawsuits. Illegal homicides of course fall under the category of murders and are a punishable offense by law. Such kind of homicides are also referred to as Culpable Homicides amounting to murder.