Relevancy to Specific v. General Intent Crimes

o       Good defense for both Specific Intent and General Intent Crimes

o       In jurisdictions that don’t use general/specific intent = if, through intoxication, somebody is unable to form the intent to do something – then you don’t have the mens rea and cannot convict

o       TRANSFERRED INTENT – if the person had the intent to commit the crime before intoxication

o       People v. Goetz – Four youths approached the Δ in the subway in NYC and asked for money.  Δ claims hypersensitivity b/c he’s been mugged before

§        Objective reasonableness of someone who is in the Δ’s situation

o       State v. Norman – Δ was part of an abusive relationship, and shot her husband while she was asleep.  Charged with 1st degree murder

§        Majority opinion says that, “Inevitability does not equate to imminence.” Threat may have been certain to occur at some point, but not about to occur at this time. 

o       State v. Rusk – Plaintiff takes defendant home in plaintiff's car. Defendant takes plaintiff up to his room and has sexual intercourse with plaintiff. Plaintiff claims that she was raped. The question is whether there was sufficient evidence shown to support the conviction.

§        The court concluded that the jury could have rationally found that the essential elements of 2nd degree rape had been established

o       People v. Evans – Defendant, through a string of lies, induced the plaintiff to enter an apartment where he had sexual intercourse with her several times.

§        Dececption, by itself, is not enough to sustain a charge of rape. There must exist force, or the threat of force.

o       United States v. Schoon – Defendants appeal their conviction for obstructing the activities of the IRS office in Tucson, Arizona and failing to comply with the order of a federal officer. The convictions stemmed from a protest staged by the defendants in order to bring attention to United States involvment in El Salvador.

§        The court held that the necessity defense was not intended as justification for illegal acts taken in indirect political protest.

o       Regina v. Dudley and Stephens – “it is better for you to die yourself than take the life of an innocent person”

o       State v. Toscano – Defendant Joseph Toscano was convicted of creating a false medical report used in a scheme to defraud insurance companies. Toscano claimed that he acted under duress because he feared for his safety and that of his family.

§        We hold that duress is an affirmative defense to a crime other than murder, and that it need not be based upon an alleged threat of immediate bodily injury

o       Roberts v. People – Defendant claims that voluntary drunkeness immediately prior to the assault of which he was convicted rendered him incapable of having the requisite intent necessary for his conviction to be sustained.

§        The court held that if his mental faculties were so far overcome by intoxication, that he was not conscious of what he was doing, that he had not sufficient capacity to entertain the intent. If, however, he did entertain the intent in fact, though but for the intoxication he would not have done so, he is responsible for the intent as well as the acts.

o       People v. Hood – Δ was voluntarily drunk and took a gun from an officer’s holster and shot the officer in the leg

§        Assault is a general intent crime, therefore, voluntary intoxication is not a good defense

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