Here’s an interesting story from the Journal Star. State’s Attorney Kevin Lyons talks about Rakiem Campbell, the 15-year-old who threw the brick off the overpass, and the reason he was charged with a more serious crime than the Bradley students who started the house fire on Laura that killed Danny Dahlquist (emphasis mine):
[The college prank] differs, [Lyons] said, from an incident last month where a 15-year-old boy threw a patio block off an interstate overpass, killing a passing motorist. In that case, the prosecutor noted, the boy probably didn’t mean to kill anyone but the fact that he threw a block and meant to hit a car made a big difference.
Did you see that phrase? “The boy probably didn’t mean to kill anyone.” That’s not first-degree murder. That’s involuntary manslaughter. According to 720 ILCS 5/9?3 (emphasis mine):
A person who unintentionally kills an individual without lawful justification commits involuntary manslaughter if his acts whether lawful or unlawful which cause the death are such as are likely to cause death or great bodily harm to some individual, and he performs them recklessly….
If the prosecutor is admitting that “the boy probably didn’t mean to kill anyone,” then shouldn’t he have charged the boy with involuntary manslaughter and let it be adjudicated through the juvenile court system?
That is, I think, the point you, I and Eyebrows were arguing yesterday. Rakeim Campbell didn’t set out to kill anyone, just do some property type damage.
On WEEK this morning, the crawl at the bottom of the screen said “online bloggers don’t think penalty for BU soccer players is harsh enough” and I got supremely annoyed.
I don’t recall that anyone here yesterday was calling for stiffer penalties for the boys involved in Dahlquist’s death. By no means! That was a tragic accident. No intent involved.
I for one was calling for a less harsh sentence for Campbell, given that he’s a kid (only 15) and as Lyons himself said, he didn’t intend to kill anyone. So how is that Murder 1? Campbell didn’t intend to kill anyone either.
The difference seems profoundly obvious to me, why is it so difficult for so many others?
To be fair, if dropping the bricks was otherwise a felony (and I don’t know if it was if he just “intended” property damage because I’m too lazy to look it up, and I’m still not convinced a 15-year-old can have adult criminal intent), it’s first-degree murder under the felony-murder rule, which basically says if you’re in the process of committing a felony and you kill someone, even accidentally or in self-defense, the killing is automatically first-degree murder. Like the felonious intent of the original felony “transfers” to the killing. This is why burglars who, say, fire a warning shot and accidentally hit someone are still charged with murder.
(Typically you see this applied in burglaries, robberies, and kidnappings most often.)
But, as noted, this depends on the brick-dropping being a felony in and of itself, and still we have the problem of whether 15-year-olds can have felonious intent sufficient for adult laws.
also, the law states that you can be charged if you should reasonably know your actions could cause death or great bodily harm. Also, felony murder applies here.
Isn’t there something in Illinois law about death resulting from arson is considered homicide? Or is that the same thing as the felony-murder example cited above? If that is the case, how can the BU students & Cox be charged with lesser offenses? I understand, in the aftermath of the Duke LaCrosse debacle, that Lyons is cautious in his approach to the prosecution of the students; but a young man died at the hands of alleged friends because of their extremely poor judgment.
Speaking of Duke, the Duke administration very quickly suspended the members of the LaCrosse team charged in the incident. Where is Bradley in this? Aren’t they curiously quiet? This is the fourth day since the fire and death, and so far almost nothing has been heard from the university. How can Mentgen and Johnson not be suspended from the university and the soccer team? Each day that passes met with silence from Bradley, damages the public perception and credibility of the university. Is this what they really want to happen while they are in the middle of a large capital campaign?
Whoa, PrairieCelt – hold the phone! A LOT of people on the BU campus knew the Dahlquist parents. Or Danny himself. The funeral just ended an hour ago.
Could you chill out just a little bit before you start railing about public perception and credibility?
BU isn’t CNN when it comes to speed of news. And there hasn’t been silence – President Glasser has made statements and attended the funeral today, from what I’m told. And pretty much every activity the soccer team was to participate in has been postponed, even ones that are two weeks out (to the best of my knowledge). So in essence, the whole team is currently suspended – not to mention the fact that they just lost four of their teammates in one fell swoop. The police have just barely figured out charges, BU doesn’t work with the same legal speed – no university or college does.
And re Duke – that was rape, which thought it turned out to be wrong – is somewhat different, IMHO, than the accident that this appears to be, however reckless or stupid it was. Rape implies significant malice and intent. Hence, suspension upon arrest by the police seems more appropriate.
In the coming weeks, I imagine the other soccer players will be suspended – but your rush to judgement seems pretty damn callous, right now, given that many folks at BU feel like they lost a son or a friend, at some level. It’s a small community here, family-like I would say. And this is a tragedy.
So chill please.
C.J., yesterday’s article about the disparity of the charges filed against Cox, Mentgen, & Johnson in the BU death, and Campell in the overpass death, raised many interesting issues.
Not only did your article and the subsequent reader comments raise debate about the issue of whether a 15 year old should be tried as an adult, it also raised issues involving equitable treatment under our judicial system; specifically is there equal justice, or equal access to justice, for members of the Africa American community, for those individuals in the lower middle to lower income groups, and for those who are not perceived as priviliged athletes?
The fact that these questions of disparate treatment are being raised and debated within the white community is significant. How often have the African American community’s complaint of bias been dismissed as “playing the race card?” But this time, the appearance of disparity is too blatant to ignore.
Of concern is how the African American community will react. Racial tension in Peoria has been flaring for the past five years (obviously, at least to me, for good reason). If the public perception is that the State’s Attorneys office is engaging in disparate treatment of the alleged offenders along racial or other class-distinctive lines, this community could find itself embroiled in very divisive debate and protest.
Let us hope our elected officials have the wisdom to apply our basic constitutional guarantee of equal justice for all to the prosecutions of both these tragic incidents.
this is interesting: lyons says ‘They didn’t intend a fire or a catastrophic result.’ here’s the arson statute: A person commits arson when, by means of fire or explosive, he knowingly:
damages any real property…without consent of the owner.
the aggravation has to do with knowing someone is present or causing great bodily harm (both apply).
if they didn’t intend a fire, then why were they charged with arson? i’m not arguing they should walk, but it makes me think the agg arson (a heavy charge, higher than involuntary manslaughter, less than murder) was a compromise so as to not have to make the choice between murder and invol. mansl.
Hey Aaron, I understand what you’re saying to and don’t get the charges either. Don’t think the roommates actually knowingly damaged property, the owner was one of the parents.
re: the Duke case — at Duke, the party in question was a semi-official team event and one of the things that came out of the rape accusations was a lot of ugly information about underage drinking, hazing, and a wide variety of violations of the student and student-athlete and NCAA standards for behavior, totally separate from the rape charges that turned out to be false.
This sounds like it was students who were all on the same team, but were in no way at a team-sponsored or -sanctioned event. If the soccer team was sponsoring such stupidity, BU would be right to suspend the entire team immediately, as Duke did with the lacrosse team. But this situation is different.
much debate can be made armchair quarterbacking in each of these cases. I would guess, that not all evidence is out in the the media on either case.
That being said, I look towards the reasonable person set of arguements to try to think this through. Campbell reportedly has a diagnosis of either ADD or ADHD and reportedly “bipolar” as listed in the media. He should be recieving some type of treatment with either diagnosis and therefore the parents are aware of the need for additional supervison.
It is reasonable to assume that a 15 year old knows that heaving a brick over side of the interstate is going to damage anything it hits. or at the very least possibly cause damage to whatever would run into it laying on the road. It is also reasonable to assume that the driver of the vehicle at the time of night had their lights on. If one goes to the Broadway overpass at night, one can see the lights of vehicles from a sufficient distance to know when one is going to pass under neath. It would have taken effort to get the brick over the top of the fence. From these assumptions, I would guess that the goal, at minimum, was to hit a vehicle. It is reasonable to assume that Campbell could not tell how many people would be in the vehicle or that unless he climbed the fence would be able to guage where the brick would hit the vehicle. It would be reasonable to assume that he could know if he knew the people in the car or not. The question for the jury is did he intend to harm someone, anyone?
In the Bradley case, it is reasonable to assume that four men in college would know that using roman candles in the manner done could start a fire. Many of us have either set them off or witnessed the use of these fireworks. They are not the same as a firecracker, which would be far less likely to start a fire. I have no knoweldge of any substance impairment of any of these men (perhaps that information is available). The intent would seem to be a prank, yet with the knowledge that a reasonable person would guess a risk of fire, would result in more severe charges being filed.
The additional difference is that the four men knew the victim and knew the location, so unless there was prior intent to harm the person known to them, it would vary the charge perhaps to a lesser one. THe question for the jury is did they intend to harm this man.
These are pretty simplistic thoughts, but sometimes it helps to break things down to begin an analysis. I think that Campbell set out to do damage and to do harm, I am not certain that the four Bradley men did or not. Again we are not privy to all the evidence, so it will most likely not make sense in either case unless we 1. sit on the juries, 2. attend the hearings, or 3. or hope the media does comprehensive coverage.
I guess that as soon as there is proof that Mr. Lyons was inhabiting the brain and soul of the Campbell kid at the time of hurling the block, then I can go along with his assessment. In the meantime, if someone takes a gun and fires it into a crowd, but says he did not intend to kill anyone… does it matter if he did or did not? The end result is that hurling the block over the railing was QUITE likely to do extreme harm to anyone in the vehicle, if the vehicle was hit.
Quit covering for this punk, C.J. Let’s call it as it really is.
Prego, if someone takes an incendiary device and shoots it into a room where someone is sleeping, but says he did not intend to kill anyone, does it matter if he did or did not? The end result is that hurling 1500°F fireballs under the door of a bedroom was QUITE likely to do extreme harm to anyone in the bedroom, if he didn’t wake up in time.
@CJ
100% agreed.
I can’t imagine that non-intoxicated college students would light a roman candle indoors and then use it in the manner they did.
My college experience was loaded with alcohol fueled idiocy and stupid ideas…but this.. this takes the cake.
“says he did not intend to kill anyone… does it matter if he did or did not?”
In terms of charge? Quite a bit.
So CJ, do you believe that these guys knew that a fire was likely to start when they lit the fireworks or did they fully expect a flash some noise and a roomate running out to a bunch of laughter. This is after all all about intent when we are talking about aggravated arson.
Did the 15 year old hope that the brick would bounce near a friends care and then they would emerge and have a good laugh at the prank?
Litmus Test:
Pretend that the following two scenarios happened over the past several weeks instead of the two we are writing about.
Scenario 1: Four 15 year old white kids, three of which had just left a soccer tournament, walk over to the Broadway overpass above I-74. For the sheer fun of it, they each pick up a large stone, then time their throws over the protective fence of the overpass, so that their stones are likely to hit a passing vehicle underneath. All four of them hit a “bullseye” on the car’s windshield, killing the passenger in the car. Each of the four kids have had relatively minor run-ins with the police before this incident.
Scenario 2:
A black 19 year old guy, after pounding down a few beers with his friends, thinks it would be funnier than hell to light some Roman Candles, place them at the base of the door leading into the room where one of his friends is sleeping. He sets off the candles, then runs out of the house, expecting his friend to come running out behind him, swearing and upset over the fiery awakening. Unfortunately, the Roman Candles cause too much spark and flame, and the bedroom catches on fire. His friend is unable to make it out of the room, and dies from the smoke and fire. The 19 year old black guy has never had a run-in of any sort with the police.
Please re-read the two scenarios above, C.J. If you still cannot differentiate between the two incidents, then I don’t know what else to add. It has nothing to do with color; has nothing to do with previous run-ins; it has EVERYTHING to do with INTENT. The four 15 year old white kids in the above scenario would have been EVERY bit as rotten as the 15 year old black kid in the real world scenario. And, as stupid as the prank was for the 19 year old black guy in the fake scenario above, the conclusions of Kevin Lyons would have been the same.
INTENT, C.J. – INTENT.
Raoul, I don’t know what the 15-year-old thought. His thoughts and feelings haven’t gotten the same amount of press attention as the Bradley kids’. My guess is that his intention was to vandalize the car and get a good laugh from it for himself only at the car owner/driver’s expense. I think it’s reasonable to believe he expected there to be damage done to the car, but not the extent of damage that was done, i.e., crashing through the windshield and killing someone.
The Bradley kids had to know that a roman candle shot off inside the house was going to do damage to the house. They probably expected it wouldn’t do much damage, perhaps just leaving burn marks in the carpet/floor (I don’t know what kind of flooring was there), etc. I think it’s equally reasonable to believe that they didn’t expect there to be as much damage as what occurred, i.e., flash fire that ended up killing someone.
Bottom line, they were both damaging property, not targeting a person.
Prego, I understand it’s about intent. I do not believe (and neither does the state’s attorney) that the 15-year-old intended to kill someone. So why the first-degree murder charge?
Also, people, drunkenness is not an exculpating factor! If you kill someone while driving drunk, we don’t give you a lighter sentence because you were drunk and making stupid decisions! The fact that the students were drunk tends to make it WORSE, not better!
You are focusing too much on the charges, they don’t mean squat. There will be no trial, the charges are an opening bid, Kevin does not go to trial they plead em out or kick em.
Both the high school and college kid’s actions were equally dangerous and had the same result. With such horrible behavior, intent should not matter. IMO, All should be charged with 1st degree murder.
intent. yes it matters. but here’s the rub: how does one prove, in a court of law, what was going on in someone’s head during a specific incident? well, (provided all this makes it into evidence), statements before, during and after the incident; actions before, during and after the incident; tesimony in court (if a defendant so chooses); and lastly inferences the jury will draw from the nature of the incident. until we accomplish the orwellian super-state in this country (which we are tilting toward), there is no scientific test to allow anyone to actually peer into the brain of anyone.
it is a reflection on the human condition: we are all thinking, feeling, conscious beings, with memories, hopes and fears. and yet no other can ever fully know what it is to be ‘john smith,’ or whoever. not our spouses, not our parents, not our children, not our friends. we float, alone, in our thoughts. does that mean we are precluded from passing any judgment on another? and if so, does that also mean that we are precluded from ever making a meaningful connection with another?
as for me, to say that we cannot, must not, pass judgment on another because we cannot truly know another, (an oft-heard cry), means we have lost all hope of connecting, of connection. and if we all do is just float, alone, in our thoughts, there is no point in perpetuating this charade.
but the fact is this: we are on this big blue watership together. we are, in any scientifically measurable way, ALL identical. i believe someday this will be realized. i have to.