People v. Chevalier | |
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Court | Supreme Court of Illinois |
Full case name | The People of the State of Illinois, Appellant, v. Maurice Chevalier, Appellee. — The People of the State of Illinois, Appellant, v. Esteban Flores, Appellee. |
Decided | September 20, 1989 |
Citation(s) | 544 N.E.2d 942; 131 Ill.2d 66 |
Court membership | |
Judge(s) sitting | Howard C. Ryan, Thomas J. Moran, William G. Clark, Benjamin K. Miller, John J. Stamos, Horace L. Calvo |
Case opinions | |
Decision by | Stamos |
Keywords | |
People v. Chevalier, 131 Ill.2d 66, 544 N.E.2d 942 (1989), was a 1989 Illinois Supreme Court decision that affirmed murder convictions in two consolidated appeals, holding that mere words or verbal admission of infidelity was not sufficient provocation for a manslaughter.
The revised Illinois homicide statute of 1986 replaced the crimes of murder and manslaughter with first and second degree homicide, but courts continued to apply case law that was decided under the old statute. The rule at the time was that adultery with the defendant's spouse was adequate provocation to reduce a murder charge to manslaughter. In the Chevalier decision, the Illinois Supreme Court overturned previous intermediate appellate cases like People v. Ambro and People v. Carr, holding that mere words or verbal communication could not be adequate provocation to reduce a murder charge to manslaughter. [1] [2] [3]
This case was consolidated with People v. Flores, 168 Ill.App.3d. In both cases the defendants' had been convicted of murder for shooting and killing their wives after a verbal admission of infidelity. [4] The murder convictions were affirmed based on the traditional categorical approach for adequate provocation. [5]
During an argument, Chevalier shot and killed his wife after she made disparaging remarks about his sexual prowess and verbally admitted to infidelity. [6]
Whether a verbal admission of infidelity is adequate provocation for a manslaughter instruction. [6]
The court held that a verbal admission of infidelity was not sufficient provocation to reduce a murder charge to manslaughter. [7] The court wrote:
In Illinois, adultery with a spouse as provocation has been limited to those instances where the parties are discovered in the act of adultery or immediately before or after such an act, and the killing immediately follows such discovery. [8] [9]
Adultery is extra-marital sex partaken by a spouse, or premarital sex partaken by a betrothed person, that is considered objectionable on social, religious, moral, or legal grounds. Although the sexual activities that constitute adultery vary, as well as the social, religious, and legal consequences, the concept exists in many cultures and shares some similarities in Christianity, Judaism and Islam. Adultery is viewed by many jurisdictions as offensive to public morals, undermining the marriage relationship.
The gay panic defense or homosexual advance defence is a strategy of legal defense, which refers to a situation in which a heterosexual individual charged with a violent crime against a homosexual individual claims they lost control and reacted violently because of an unwanted sexual advance that was made upon them. A defendant will use available legal defenses against assault and murder, with the aim of seeking an acquittal, a mitigated sentence, or a conviction of a lesser offense. A defendant may allege to have found the same-sex sexual advances so offensive or frightening that they were provoked into reacting, were acting in self-defense, were of diminished capacity, or were temporarily insane, and that this circumstance is exculpatory or mitigating.
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People v. Berry is a voluntary manslaughter case that is widely taught in American law schools for the appellate court's unusual interpretation of heat of passion doctrine. Although the defendant had time to "cool down" between his wife's verbal admission of infidelity and the killing, the California Supreme Court held that the provocation in this case was adequate to reduce a murder charge to manslaughter. The lower court had relied on the traditional definition of "adequate provocation" in its jury instructions. The California Supreme Court reversed Berry's murder conviction, while affirming Berry's conviction for assault using deadly force.
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Baldwin v. G. A. F. Seelig, Inc., 294 U.S. 511 (1935), was a United States Supreme Court case which held that a state may not regulate intrastate prices by prohibiting the importation of less expensive goods in interstate commerce. It established the principle that one state, in its dealings with another, cannot place itself in economic isolation.
South-Central Timber Development v. Wunnicke, 467 U.S. 82 (1984), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held unconstitutional Alaska's inclusion of a requirement that purchasers of state-owned timber process it within state before it was shipped out of state. According to a plurality opinion by Justice White, Alaska could not impose "downstream" conditions in the timber-processing market as a result of its ownership of the timber itself. The opinion summarized "[the] limit of the market-participant doctrine" as "allowing a State to impose burdens on commerce within the market in which it is a participant, but [to] go no further. The State may not impose conditions [that] have a substantial regulatory effect outside of that particular market."
Monty Python v. American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. was a case where the British comedy group Monty Python claimed that the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) had violated their copyright and caused damage to their artistic reputation by broadcasting drastically edited versions of several of their shows. An appeals court found in favor of Monty Python, directing a ban of further broadcasts by ABC on the basis of violation of the Lanham Act, which could provide protection in the United States similar to that provided by moral rights in Europe, and gave the opinion that the group's copyright had probably also been infringed.
Manslaughter is a crime in the United States. Definitions can vary among jurisdictions, but manslaughter is invariably the act of causing the death of another person in a manner less culpable than murder. Three types of unlawful killings constitute manslaughter. First, there is voluntary manslaughter which is an intentional homicide committed in "sudden heat of passion" as the result of adequate provocation. Second, there is the form of involuntary manslaughter which is an unintentional homicide that was committed in a criminally negligent manner. Finally, there is the form of involuntary manslaughter which is an unintentional homicide that occurred during the commission or attempted commission of an unlawful act which does not amount to a felony.
State v. Dumlao is a 1986 criminal Hawaii Intermediate Court of Appeals case appealing a murder conviction on the ground that the court's decision to not issue a jury instruction for voluntary manslaughter based on extreme emotional disturbance was a reversible error. The court found that the Model Penal Code required a subjective analysis of whether provocation is adequate from the defendant's perspective. Based on medical testimony that Dumlao suffered from "paranoid personality disorder", which included symptoms of "unwarranted suspiciousness" and hypersensitivity, the Court granted Dumlao's appeal, holding that his actions on the night he killed his mother in law had been "reasonable" from his perspective.
State v. Shane is a 1992 Ohio Supreme Court voluntary manslaughter case that developed a two-step test for "reasonably sufficient provocation" and held that verbal confessions of adultery could not be "reasonably sufficient" provocation.
People v. Valentine, 28 Cal.2d 121, 169 P.2d 1 (1946) is a landmark California Supreme Court voluntary manslaughter case where the court holds that mere words may be adequate provocation.
The categorical test is a legal standard for determining whether there has been adequate provocation to reduce a murder charge to voluntary manslaughter. Traditionally, the mens rea for murder was malice aforethought. While murder and voluntary manslaughter are both intentional homicides, adequate provocation mitigates a defendant's culpability. Adequate provocation is a legal requirement for a murder charge to be reduced to voluntary manslaughter. The test for adequate provocation varies across jurisdictions and has changed over time. The categorical approach is based on common law principles, but most courts today apply less restrictive tests, such as the extreme emotional disturbance test in Model Penal Code jurisdictions.
Text of People v. Chevalier is available from: Leagle