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Criminal Law Keyed to Kennedy
State of North Carolina v. Judy Ann Laws Norman
Citation:
324 N.C. 253 (1989)
ProfessorScott Caron
CaseCast™ – "What you need to know"
Facts
The defendant shot her husband three times in the back of the head as he lay sleeping in his bed. Her husband was abusive and a psychologist testified that the defendant “believed herself to be doomed . . . to a life of the worst kind of torture and abuse, degradation that she had experienced over the years in a progressive way; that it would only get worse, and that death was inevitable.” She was convicted of involuntary manslaughter.
The Court of Appeals granted her a new trial and held that the defendant was entitled to have the jury consider whether the homicide was an act self-defense and, thus, not a legal wrong. The government appealed.
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