Talk:Lesser included offense

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2009 comments

"just as battery is necessarily a lesser included offense to murder, and false imprisonment is usually a lesser included offense to kidnapping." Isn't this confusing criminal and civil law? No person would be charged by a public prosecutor for battery and murder, niether false imprisonment and kidnapping. The two former are civil offenses and the two latter are criminal. —Preceding unsigned comment added by DGGenuine (talk • contribs) 00:51, 24 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hung jury

"if the jury acquits the defendant of the more serious offense but is otherwise unable to reach a verdict (i.e., is hung) on the lesser included offense, the defendant may be retried if the prosecutor chooses to do so, but only for the lesser included offense" This would seem to be contradicted by Blueford v. Arkansas 198.145.220.69 (talk) 02:37, 26 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I removed this paragraph from the article:

In some jurisdictions, if the jury acquits the defendant of the more serious offense but is otherwise unable to reach a verdict (i.e., is hung) on the lesser included offense, the defendant may only be retried if the prosecutor chooses, but only for the lesser included offense. In others, a jury is not permitted to render such a "partial verdict". If the jury finds the defendant not guilty of the lesser included offense, there would be no need to make a determination on the more serious offense, as acquittal of a lesser included offense automatically constitutes acquittal of the more serious offense.

There are several cases, including Blueford v. Arkansas which was decided by the Supreme Court, which completely contradict this paragraph. Since it has no citations, I just removed it. I couldn't find an adequate source to cite to replace the paragraph but I hope somebody can. neilk (talk) 21:53, 13 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Issues

The third paragraph of the lead includes, "However, if the person charged proves to the court their actions were not as serious to constitute recklessness, may in some jurisdictions qualify as the lesser-included offense of improper driving, which is not a crime and is only punishable by a fine.

- This is not referenced.
- The content, "some jurisdictions" is vague.
- I am not sure where the content, "may in some jurisdictions qualify as the lesser-included offense of improper driving, which is not a crime and is only punishable by a fine.", comes from. If a court or a district attorney amends or reduces a charge of a traffic violation to a lesser charge, that is not the same as being convicted of a lesser-included offense, which seems to be an assertion of the merger doctrine. Also, the vague use of "some" extends not only to which jurisdictions concerning the lesser-included offense but which jurisdictions might classify improper driving as a civil offense. -- Otr500 (talk) 03:33, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]