Criminal Law Keyed to Dressler
State v. Formella
Facts
Formella (D) and some of his friends, all high school students, were asked to be lookouts while some other students stole math exams from inside the school. They agreed and did a survey to check for any other person while they were on the way to their lockers. After getting their books out, they decided that what they had planned was wrong and left the building. However, the other group went on to steal the exams. Formella admitted that he was involved in the theft and was convinced of theft on the ground of criminal liability for the conduct of another person as an accomplice. He appealed on the ground that the trial court had been mistaken in not finding the fact that he had left his complicity before the completion of the theft, which under the accomplice liability act proved he was not an accomplice. The act provides that no one will be liable as an accomplice if he withdraws his complicity before the offense is committed and wholly deprives his complicity of having any effectiveness in the commission of the crime, or gives timely warning to the law enforcement authorities, or makes appropriate efforts to prevent the offense of being committed. The state supreme court granted review.
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