What is the difference between 1st degree murder and 2nd degree?
It varies from state to state. Basically a state can determine what circumstances will be considered murder in the first or murder in the second. Traditionally, in common law, the difference is premeditation. In other words, first degree murder is when you plan to kill a person and then actually do so, after having some amount of time to “cool down” or change your mind. Lying in wait for an ambush, or going home to get a gun and then coming back and killing someone are classic examples of premeditation. Second degree murder is when you intentionally kill a person (or intentionally hurt a person who dies as a result of the injury you inflict) but without prior planning. Some states, however have different criteria for what constitutes murder in the first degree. It could depend on who you kill (a police officer, a witness to a crime, a child), or how the killing occurs (as part of a kidnapping, a torture killing, aggravating circumstances that “shock the conscience”).
