Tag Archives: CC 520


Aider And Abettor Liability For Implied Malice Murder: Required Elements Not Included in CALCRIM
March 21st, 2023

This post Aider And Abettor Liability For Implied Malice Murder: Required Elements Not Included in CALCRIM addressed the failure of the CALCRIM instructions to include the required element when the defendant is charged with aiding and abetting a perpetrator who is alleged to have acted with implied malice.   These defects in the CALCRIM instructions […]


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Aider And Abettor Liability For Implied Malice Murder: Required Elements Not Included in CALCRIM
February 27th, 2023

This post Aider And Abettor Liability For Implied Malice Murder: Required Elements Not Included in CALCRIM addressed the failure of the CALCRIM instructions to include the required element when the defendant is charged with aiding and abetting a perpetrator who is alleged to have acted with implied malice.   These defects in the CALCRIM instructions […]


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Aider And Abettor Liability For Implied Malice Murder: Required Elements Not Included in CALCRIM
January 24th, 2023

This post Aider And Abettor Liability For Implied Malice Murder: Required Elements Not Included in CALCRIM addressed the failure of the CALCRIM instructions to include the required element when the defendant is charged with aiding and abetting a perpetrator who is alleged to have acted with implied malice. These defects in the CALCRIM instructions were […]


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Aider And Abettor Liability For Implied Malice Murder: Required Elements Not Included in CALCRIM
November 30th, 2022

Direct aiding and abetting is based on the combined actus reus of the participants and the aider and abettor’s “own mens rea.” (People v. McCoy (2001) 25 Cal.4th 1111, 1122; see also People v. Powell (2021) 63 Cal.App.5th 689, 712-13.) The aider and abettor’s mens rea includes several subjective mental elements as observed by People […]


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Implied Malice Murder: Defendant Must Be Subjectively Aware That The Committed Act Was “Inherently Dangerous To Human Life”
August 12th, 2019

Implied malice has both objective and subjective components. The objective test requires “‘“an act, the natural consequences of which are dangerous to life … .”’” (People v. Knoller (2007) 41 Cal.4th 139, 143.) This means the act must carry “‘a high degree of probability that it will result in death.’” (Id. at p. 152.) The […]


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CALCRIM Revisions
June 28th, 2019

Effective March 15, 2019 the Judicial Council approved for publication revisions to the following CALCRIM instructions which were published in the March 2019 edition of the Judicial Council of California Criminal Jury Instructions. Instruction Number Instruction Title   104, 202, 222   Evidence, Note-Taking and Read Back of Evidence   301, 334, 335   Single […]


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Error to Instruct on Felony Murder, but Not Malice Murder, its Lesser Included Offenses, or the Defenses of Accident and Self-defense
August 8th, 2016

In People v. Gonzalez , District: 2 DCA , Division: 4 , Case #: B255375 the prosecutor charged appellants with malice murder but tried the case solely on a felony murder theory. The trial court did not instruct the jury on malice murder, its LIOs, or the defenses of accident and self-defense. “[U]nder the accusatory […]


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Is the Erroneous Failure to Instruct on Malice Murder Always Harmless Error When the Jury Finds the Defendant Guilty of First Degree Murder?
August 5th, 2016

People v. Campbell (2015) 233 CA4th 148, suggested that a jury’s guilty verdict on felony murder and its true finding on a robbery special circumstance allegation do not render the failure to instruct on LIOs of malice murder harmless under Watson: While in the present case we are not dealing with the failure to give […]


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Malice and Voluntary Intoxication
August 14th, 2015

People v. Turk (2008) 164 Cal. App. 4th 1361, 1382, rejected the defendant’s argument that the instruction gave insufficient guidance that malice aforethought and intent to kill are the same thing. The jury was instructed under CC 520 in defining murder that, “[t]he defendant acted with express malice if he unlawfully intended to kill.” (Ibid.)  […]


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Felony Murder: Disagreements and Confusion
June 19th, 2015

  On April 23, 2010, CC 521 was revised. As explained by the CC Committee, “the definition of deliberation and premeditation in [CC No. 521], Murder: Degrees could be misleading in cases in which an extended act, such as strangling or drowning, causes the homicide.” (Advisory Committee on Criminal Jury Instructions, Report to the Judicial […]


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