The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that hiring a hit man to commit murder does not inherently constitute a "crime of violence" under federal law, even when the contract killing is successfully carried out.
In a unanimous decision, a three-judge panel vacated two felony convictions for James Henrikson, a magnate convicted of soliciting contract killings related to an oil well dispute in North Dakota. The court determined that while Henrikson had paid a hit man tens of thousands of dollars to murder an employee and shoot a co-investor, the "solicitation" of these crimes did not meet the legal definition of violence, irrespective of the fatal outcome.
The judges reasoned that the federal statute requires evidence of the conspirators' intent to use force for a conviction. They noted that a lower court had previously dismissed two related convictions because other planned hits ordered by Henrikson were never executed. However, the appeals court extended this, stating that even soliciting a completed hit is not "categorically a crime of violence."
The ruling hinges on the legal concept of "mens rea," or guilty mind, which distinguishes between intentional crimes like premeditated murder and lesser offenses such as involuntary manslaughter. While contracting a murder appears to be a clear instance of a guilty mind, the court found that the federal solicitation statute does not mandate proof that the hit man specifically intended the victim's death. It only requires that the employer took the necessary steps to ensure the victim's demise, and that death subsequently resulted.
This decision places the 9th Circuit in opposition to the 4th Circuit, which previously held a differing view in a similar case. The 4th Circuit had ruled that if a defendant conspires with the specific intent for a murder to occur for payment, and death results, then the defendant acted with specific intent to cause the victim's death. The 9th Circuit dismissed this logic, citing a subsequent Supreme Court ruling that it deemed undermined the 4th Circuit's legal basis and stating it was inappropriate to extrapolate intent from one element of a crime to another.
While this ruling theoretically reduces Henrikson's sentence, it will not affect his time served, as he is already incarcerated with two consecutive life sentences for related offenses.
