Normally, I have a pretty good idea of the consequences my villains will face if it’s the kind of story where they’re still around to face consequences at the end, but the case at the heart of this story is weird. I’m not sure if there’s any kind of precedent for something like this. Let me lay out the scenario for you: 1) The victim, an engineer at a pump company, discovers major workplace safety violations and files a whistleblower report with OSHA. The resulting inspection costs the company millions of dollars in fines and seriously threatens the career of his boss. 2) The boss manages to discover the whistleblower’s identity via bribery. The boss wants the victim gone, but moving against him directly would look like retaliation, so he begins using tactics akin to Zersetzung in the hopes of making him quit due to a breakdown in his personal life. Forcing him to work long hours so he never gets to see his family, spoofing texts to make it look like the victim and the boss’s secretary are having an affair, etc. 3) When this doesn’t prompt the victim to quit, the boss and his secretary escalate to poisoning his thermos with a methanol solution. They hope to provoke a health crisis, cause him to look like a drunk—which could disrupt his home life because he’s a devout Muslim—get him pulled over by the police for a DUI, anything that could get rid of him. 4) Again, nothing. The victim is trapped at this job by limited prospects. The boss and secretary decide to poison him with a lethal dose of the methanol solution. 5) On his drive home that night, the victim is pulled over by a police officer for failure to maintain his lane. The officer smells alcohol and conducts a breathalyzer test, which shows he’s well over the legal limit. The officer attempts to place him under arrest. 6) At this point, the victim is absolutely out of his mind due to the poisoning. Experiencing vivid hallucinations, he attacks the officer. Overpowered and in fear of his life, the officer draws his weapon and fires. The victim dies immediately. I can nail down conspiracy and some bribery charges, but the manner of the victim’s death is giving me trouble in terms of how it should be charged. Some important points: The boss never poisoned the victim himself, instead directly ordering his secretary to do so. Both the boss and the secretary absolutely intended to murder the victim. The final poisoning was a high enough dose he would have died without treatment; the officer simply happened to kill him before the methanol did. The victim would not have attacked the officer—or even been pulled over in the first place—if he hadn’t been poisoned. So what would a District Attorney charge this as? First degree murder? Maybe something under the felony murder rule? Like I said, the way the victim died is troublesome here. Also, are there any possible charges resulting from the spoofed texts and gaslighting campaign? That area of law seems largely uncharted, and my knowledge of it is almost nonexistent. For reference, this story is set in Oklahoma in 2035 so we’re talking about the relevant state laws here. There could be some federal charges related to bribery at OSHA, but my focus is on the state case. Any help you guys can provide is much appreciated.
It would depend largely on how much political power and clout the boss has. This sort of thing happens all the time... we don't hear about it if the suspect is somebody powerful enough, with the right connections—if anything he'll get promoted or swapped to a better position. On the other hand, if he doesn't have connections, he'll be smeared all over the newsmedia and taken down hard. It also depends on what kind of political structure the country has in, what did you say? 2035? Is it basically like it is now? Or has it changed?
I would say yes to the first degree murder under the felony murder theory. The boss is obviously a co-conspirator. Poisoning someone -- even if the intent isn't to kill them -- is a felony. When a felony results in a death, the person or people committing the felony get(s) charged with murder. The problem for the plot, though, is who is going to figure this out and how?
In this case he poisoned a woman but she died of a heart attack. Big difference is that it wouldn't have killed her on a single dose so he was found not guilty of murder but was convicted for attempted murder. https://www.lawteacher.net/cases/r-v-white.php However they established the legal principle of "but for". But for the heart attack, would she have died? In your case, but for the shooting, would he have died. I think that would be strong enough to convict as though the poisoning had killed him. In this case https://caselaw.findlaw.com/ga-supreme-court/1592081.html he was given two consecutive life sentences for 'malice murder' (shot two employees). As for not performing the act himself, if two or more conspire to murder and one or more act on it then all are given the same sentence. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1117 Note: I am not giving legal advice. I also live in the UK where there is one legal system and not a confusing hodge podge of state and federal law. I imagine it all depends on where the story takes place. It also seems to depend on whether they used national infrastructure in their conspiracy which is just plain odd in my British eyes.
This is obviously complex but the poisoning along with the other factors would probably be enough to put them in jail for a long time, probably life. Anyways, as for the other stuff, it's sort of similar to SWATTING. In this case, the caller got 20 years, and he didn't even intend to kill the victim. I don't know why the other guy involved only got 2 years. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Wichita_swatting Here's another interesting case: https://www.twincities.com/2011/07/12/blaine-hacker-barry-ardolf-gets-18-years-for-tormenting-neighbor/ Like your example, many crimes were committed throughout that ordeal so it's hard to say what charges would occur if the harassment involved mostly legal, petty acts.
That might be one of those cases where the jury is giving a range of options. Attempted murder would be a slam dunk. Negligent homicide would seem a piece of cake. Even murder one can be argued fairly easily, providing that prosecution and expert witnesses can convince a jury that the defendant inflicted wounds on the victim that would have been fatal. Think of it like a drive-by shooting. If the victim, a driver, gets shot in the head, crashes his car, gets ejected through the windshield, hits a brick wall and "dies" from a broken neck, well, just arguing semantics at that point (though law is all about semantics). If I were a fancy, big city lawyer, I would argue that the defendant: 1. Wanted the victim dead 2. Entered into a conspiracy to make them dead 3. Effected action that led directly to the victim's death The complexity of the action in that last part would be the kicker. You'd have to explain it to a jury in dipshit simple terms that would trump the defenses equally dipshit simple efforts to sow reasonable doubt. Given the complexity and callousness of the crime--assuming that all gets revealed in court--the defendants would go to jail forever regardless of charge. Shit, you can probably be executed for littering in Oklahoma.
Not much. He has plenty of wealth and is used to just buying his way out of trouble, which is sort of his fatal flaw. Bribery won’t get you very far when the people coming after you can’t be bought. More or less the same. The biggest differences are more widespread crime and government corruption due to a Great Depression-level economic crisis in 2026 and the proliferation of superpowers due to some late Cold War and early War on Terror experiments leaking into the air and water. But the latter has no impact on this story. Already got this angle covered, though it’s probably too long to explain here. This story stars the same prosecutor/vigilante duo from “Law, Love, and the Whippoorwill”, which is the subject of my last thread over in Success Stories. Since the DA asks for her help, Whippoorwill is technically an agent of the state in relation to this case. That takes some of her usual investigative tools—like the third-party search rule—off the table, which seemed like an interesting story. Forensics on the thermos, suspicious payments to an OSHA inspector, and the inspector revealing who bribed him to unmask the whistleblower will be the key clues that blow this case wide open, while the spoofed texts will be a red herring which points suspicion at the victim’s wife. # Thanks to everyone who replied, I feel pretty comfortable going with first degree murder charges. I may also add something for each of the poisonings where there wasn’t intent to kill, probably either Assault With Intent to Commit a Felony or Aggravated Assault & Battery, but I’m not sure.
