Last week I blogged about the basic rules for felony murder prosecutions in North Carolina. I promised to return this week with an update on the felony murder rule and the merger doctrine. This post, like Jeff’s 2009 article, focuses on the merger rule that bars charges of felony murder that are based upon killings resulting from certain types of felony assaults. It does not address the merger rule that requires the court to arrest judgment on the underlying felony when a defendant is convicted of first-degree murder solely on the basis of felony murder. What is the merger rule? The merger doctrine holds that felony murder may not be predicated upon a felony that “is an integral part of the homicide” and is “an offense included [i]n fact within the offense charged.” People v. Ireland, 70 Cal.2d 522, 539 (1969) (applying this principle where the felonious assault and the homicide were committed against the same victim; holding that defendant could not be convicted of felony murder for killing his wife by assaulting her with a deadly weapon). What is the rationale for the rule? The merger doctrine exists to prevent every felonious assault that results in a person’s death from rising to the level of first-degree murder. Without the doctrine, a defendant’s intentional assault of another with a deadly weapon resulting in the victim’s death would constitute first-degree murder—regardless of whether the defendant intended to kill the victim. Courts have applied the merger rule to prevent this sort of “bootstrapping,” [...]
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