# People v. Aaron

> Michigan Supreme Court · November 24, 1980 · 409 Mich. 672

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9721921

## Case

- **Full name:** People v. Aaron; People v. Thompson; People v. Wright
- **Court:** Michigan Supreme Court
- **Decided:** November 24, 1980
- **Citations:** 409 Mich. 672; 299 N.W.2d 304; 13 A.L.R. 4th 1180; 1980 Mich. LEXIS 254
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by Williams
- **Judges:** Ryan, Williams, Coleman, Kavanagh, Levin, Moody, Fitzgerald, Fitzgerald'S
- **Cited by:** 306 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases.
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9721921

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- stating “[hjowever, our finding that Michigan has never specifically adopted the doctrine which defines malice to include the intent to commit the underlying felony is not the end of our inquiry. In Michigan, the general rule is that the common law prevails except as abrogated…
- holding that the prosecution must prove—in relevant part—that a defendant acted in wanton and willful disregard of the likelihood that the natural tendency of defendant’s behavior was to cause death to establish that a killing that occurred during the commission of a felony am…
- holding that under the Michigan felony-murder statute, the mental element of murder is not satisfied by proof of the intention to commit the underlying felony, but instead must be separately shown
- noting that felony aggravator statutes were enacted by 22 states, including Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, …

## Opinion text

Williams, J.
(concurring in part). I concur in the result reached by my brothers Fitzgerald and Ryan. I agree with my brother Fitzgerald’s and my brother Ryan’s opinions as to their definitions of murder and as to definitions of malice in People v Morrin, 31 Mich App 301, 310-311 ; 187 NW2d 434 (1971).
In my opinion, it is the language of the statute that determines whether there need be proof of malice in a so-called felony-murder casé. MCL 750.316; MSA 28.548, until its amendment this year, read as follows:
"All murder which shall be perpetrated by means of poison, or lying in wait, or any other kind of wilful, deliberate and premeditated killing, or which shall be committed in the perpetration, or attempt to perpetrate any arson, rape, robbery, burglary, larceny of any kind, extortion or kidnapping, shall be murder of the fírst degree * * (Emphasis supplied.)
What is critical in the statutory language is that the section begins “All murder which” and ends *747 "shall be murder of the first degree”. In other words, what becomes murder of the first degree is not any homicide which is in connection with a poisoning, for example, or certain named felonies but a murder which is in connection with a poisoning or certain named felonies. The proof of malice is not essential to all forms of homicide, but it is essential to all forms of murder. Maher v People, 10 Mich 212, 218 (1862). Hence, proof of a so-called felony murder under MCL 750.316 requires proof of malice as does any other murder.
I concur in Justice Fitzgerald’s rule of retrospectivity.

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9721921. Public record. Not legal advice.