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47 Tex. Tech L. Rev. 121 (2014-2015)
Unintentional Killings

handle is hein.journals/text47 and id is 131 raw text is: UNINTENTIONAL KILLINGS
Arnold H. Loewy*
I.  DEPRAVED-HEART     M URDER   .............................................................. 123
II.  FELONY  M URDER  ................................................................................ 126
III.  C ON CLU SION   ....................................................................................... 128
The concept of criminalizing unintentional homicides sounds almost
oxymoronic until one realizes that unintentional does not mean fault free. The
unintentional killings that have been punished in the last century run the gamut
from the blameless to the highly blameworthy. In this brief Essay, I intend to
examine the gamut of unintentional killings and assess the wisdom of various
courts' treatment of them.
Although one would think that liability without fault would never be a
basis upon which to predicate homicidal liability, such is not universally the
case. More than half a century ago, New York, with a rather extreme
application of the misdemeanor-manslaughter rule, held a landlord absolutely
liable for the death of a tenant for failure to have adequate fire escapes.'
While that might not sound so terrible (big wicked landlord allowing his
poor tenants to perish because of the inadequacy of his fire escapes), the actual
facts of the case did not meet that eminently explicable explanation.2 The
landlord, a previous tenant named Nelson, was a poorly educated
African-American.3 His landlord was prepared to close the building, because
he knew it was not up to code, and evict everybody.4 Instead, he offered
Nelson a chance to buy the building at a low price without disclosing his failure
to   meet   the   code    standard.5  Nevertheless,   by    applying   the
misdemeanor-manslaughter rule, the New York Court of Appeals upheld
Nelson's conviction.6
Although for a time I thought Nelson to be a relic of a bygone time, the
Ohio Supreme Court recently held that a woman who crosses the centerline of a
highway, killing three people, can be guilty of involuntary manslaughter even if
the reason for her crossing the centerline was a heart attack that rendered her
unconscious.7 While the case, State v. Weitbrecht, merely upheld the state's
* George Killam Professor of Criminal Law, Texas Tech University School of Law.
1. People v. Nelson, 128 N.E.2d 391, 393 (N.Y. 1955).
2. Id. at 394-95 (Van Voorhis, J., dissenting).
3. Id. at394.
4. Id
5. Id. at 394-95.
6. Id. at 393 (majority opinion).
7. State v. Weitbrecht, 715 N.E.2d 167, 172 (Ohio 1999) (Pfeifer, J., dissenting).

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