Criminal Law Juvenile Homicide Cases: Florida v.

Criminal Law

Juvenile Homicide Cases: Florida v. Tate and Florida v. King

In Florida v. Tate, the facts supported charging the defendant with murder as well as charging him with a variety of lesser-included offenses, including the different levels of homicide and aggravated assault. However, there was no evidence of other crimes like kidnapping or conspiracy. In Florida v. King, the facts supported charging the juvenile defendants with conspiracy to commit murder. However, the facts also supported charging the adult defendant with sexual assault of a minor, conspiracy to commit murder, and it looks as if either harboring a runaway or kidnapping charges might also have applied to him.

Based on the facts in the case, the defense attorney in Florida v. Tate took an unusual approach in his defense of Tate. The injuries described in the articles about the case simply do not support the theory that the death was the accidental result of a body slam or anything that the defendant would have been imitating is watching wrestling if the defendant was of normal intelligence or emotional state. There appears to be a lack of evidence about his neuropsychological condition and cognitive functioning, and that seems to be a critical error, because the jury was forced to determine whether the defendant was culpable as an adult. Using a diminished capacity approach and providing evidence that the defendant was not functioning at the same cognitive level as a same-age child, who would have been aware that his actions would result in serious bodily injury or death, seems as if it would have been the only approach to result in a not-guilty verdict. The jury had to have a reason to believe that this adult-sized child, who acted in a manner that was far more violent than anything they would expect from a child his age, would not grow up to become more violent, but, instead, have the capability of learning that those actions were not acceptable, and the defense offered simply did not provide that belief.

In Florida v. King, the primary defense available to Alex King would also have been some type of diminished capacity defense possibly based on a psychiatric diagnosis based on his sexual assault by the adult co-defendant. While the defense seems to have presented evidence of the sexual relationship between Alex King and the adult defendant, it does not appear that it presented evidence of the underlying psychology of child sexual abuse and the culture of secrecy surrounding childhood sexual abuse. It also appears as if the boys presented a common defense, which seems like an unusual defense strategy, since Alex was the one who was allegedly being assaulted by the family friend. There was no explanation for why the older brother was involved in the murder. Therefore, by presenting a common defense, the defense attorney hampered his defense of Alex King, because it seems that suggesting that the older brother, who lacked any underlying reason to engage in the crime, had greater culpability for the crime, and the defense should have concentrated on the role of the older brother's influence in the crime.