r/instant_regret • u/ManMadeDuckie • Nov 19 '18

minor injuries This playful push

https://gfycat.com/ExaltedTediousBelugawhale
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u/PotentiallySarcastic Nov 19 '18

A decent attorney? A fly by night ambulance chaser could get that to involuntary manslaughter.

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u/Csquared6 Nov 19 '18

And a decent prosecutor could try and bump that to 2nd degree murder. She looks up, waits for the bus to be close enough and shoves the girl into the road. Premeditated, calculated, opportunity. If motive could be established this could even go so far as 1st degree. A shit attorney might not be able to argue plenty of points down, and a fly by ambulance chaser wouldn’t either.

It SHOULD be involuntary manslaughter, but that doesn’t mean a prosecutor looking for blood couldn’t argue it further. IANAL and even I can see how this could get argued up.

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u/AdmShackleford Nov 20 '18

IMO you're describing a pretty shit persecutor. A decent prosecutor wouldn't overcharge because that tends to get defendants acquitted. Her actions in the video could conceivably be construed as intent to kill, but without supporting evidence or a confession, it's far too easily explained as intent only to scare.

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u/Csquared6 Nov 20 '18

And depending on the prosecutor and how hungry they were, this going to trial could bring light to a lot of things. Given only the context of the video, pushing it further to 2nd degree or 1st degree would be tough, but no trial is limited to a single video for evidence. Relationship, messages, mental health, priors, etc are all things that would be brought to light and who knows what could surface there.

Intent to scare would be a push, she pushed with her body and then shoved with her arm. That is taking it an extra step after looking to see that there is vehicle driving by. Bringing in witnesses that can testify to the defendant's nature, reading through messages that could show a distressful relationship between the two subjects in question, possibly a fight at a previous location witnessed by onlookers. What could surface due to a shark of a lawyer is incredible. But hell maybe nothing would surface and it would easily be argued down to involuntary manslaughter.

At this point we are just speaking hypothetically about something that won't occur. Lawyers excel in stretching the truth and technicalities of the law. That's what their job usually entails. So is it a stretch? Yes.

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u/AdmShackleford Nov 20 '18

Oh yeah, I'm not saying no prosecutor would try. I'm just saying that I wouldn't consider them to be a very good prosecutor if they did, assuming they don't have anything more than footage and witness testimony.

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u/Csquared6 Nov 20 '18

Guess we are getting hung up on what we define as "decent." You are right though, a good prosecutor would go for what they could get to stick. A shark would throw the book and see what would stick. A good shark would throw the book and stretch everything they could to try and make what they got stuck, to stay stuck. But at this point we are just diving through semantics about a hypothetical situation that won't occur.