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But at least in the case of a getaway driver, the driver absolutely knows and is an active participant in the murder. He knows he’s driving someone to a place where they fully intend to shoot someone, and they know after the fact they will be helping them escape. If an adult I share an apartment with takes my car keys and drives to someone’s house and shoots them, I’m not involved. I had no reason to think that a crime would result from me leaving the keys on the counter.
They don't know any of that. Probably they have a great record of robbing without killing anyone, almost no criminals are arrested for their first crime, or even their 30th. Then one time it happens and boom they are on the hook for murder 1. You can probably buy a gun for a million kids and most won't go on to murder someone with it. Being from a hunting family I received a gun much younger, and I didn't kill anyone.
These parents fucked up hard, and they should be punished. It is their responsibility to society and to humans everywhere to not let this happen. Let this be a lesson.
It’s unreasonable to hold someone responsible for choices that other people make unless they’re knowingly making choices that a reasonable individual would see an enabling a crime. If I leave my keys on the counter, that’s not participating in the roommate using my car to drive to his girlfriend’s house and shoot her. If I know he’s going to get her in some way and I knowingly give him the keys, sure I get that. Any person watching would interpret that as me giving the guy the keys to go harm his girlfriend.
I think it has to go through that reasonable man test. If a reasonable person looks at the situation and says that the parents knew or reasonably should have known that he wanted to kill people, and they knowingly provide him a weapon and ammo and refuse to secure it, yes, they’re involved. But if it’s “there are guns in the house,” not really. And especially if the kid gets into a safe or something, at that point, they’ve done everything reasonably doable to keep the kid from getting a gun.
The problem with "reasonable man" tests is they get evaluated in retrospect. It's easy to rationalize that a "reasonable man" would have acted differently if you know how things turned out.
Aren’t most of us doing this now? I mean most people are assuming that this was negligent simply because a shooting occurred. But my contention is outside of buying a troubled teen a gun and taking him to gun ranges to practice with it (which is negligent) a lot of the things they did would not be that unusual for a family that owns guns. And I think that matters because you shouldn’t be able to convict someone of not taking extraordinary measures to prevent a crime.
Yes, that's my point. These "reasonable man" tests are presented as a way of softening a Draconian-appearing rule such as "if you buy a gun for your child, you're responsible for any murders he commits" or even "if you have a child you're responsible for any murders he commits". The problem is the "reasonable man" test only gets applied when something bad has already happened, and the reasoning of "if something bad happened, the parenting must have been unreasonable" is irresistible to juries. And thus people learn that if you don't want to risk going to jail for murder you just don't buy your kid a gun full stop -- or you just don't have a child.
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