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Criminal Law: Homicide, Ellen Y. Suni

Faculty Works

Substantive criminal law in Missouri has undergone substantial change in recent years. The most significant aspect of this change has been the adoption of the criminal code which discarded common law definitions of crime and redefined offenses in accord with the more modern Model Penal Code ap­proach. Although the code's drafters recommended major revision of the homicide statutes, these revisions were not ultimately adopted and the Mis­souri homicide statutes retained their common law approach. A combination of United States Supreme Court decisions, legislative activity and Missouri cases decided during the last decade, however, have led to important develop­ments in the …