A moral dilemma

[Benny2guns]

@ Benny
For me that analogy isn't perfect. The case of the unsolved murder is more like "If a tree falls in the forest and there's nobody there, did it really fall?" To me the clear answer is yes. In the case of the murder, someone is clearly dead, never mind that nobody saw him die. If there's a victim, there's a crime, right?

@ Scrufuss

Hmmm

OK now you got me here after answering the last one..
The crook who shot killed the man, off with his head. (France had some style...)
The 2nd crook would be guilty of manslaughter (no possibility of parole) since a hi velocity projectile tends to maul and slaughter a human body as it passes thru. Or at the least attempted murder (parole possible in a decade, maybe)

I guess what I mean is, if the second gunman clearly wanted his victim to die just as much as the first gunmen had his own victim, then why should he get leniency just because he didn't succeed? To me he's just as much a coldblooded murderer as the first guy, only he's got worse aim. I know legally, it'll be ruled as attempted murder, but just morally it seems wrong to me. Just a thought.

@ Billy
As you can tell from my answers before, to me the act itself is important, and the intent behind it. So in your scenario, assuming the man didn't have a reason to do it (like saving the kid from a man-eating lion or whatever) and really did it to hurt, then for me it doesn't matter if the kid is unharmed. The guy should be hanged. That's my moral opinion. Legally, he'd get attempted murder or something.

No addy and bill, there is no murder unless the crime itself is recognized as a crime. I say you are only guilty of a crime and a crime has only been committed when your cought,charged and convicted. If the stated murders took place but were and will never be uncovered then no murder took place in the eyes of humanity.