State v. Johnson

Richard Johnson (defendant) and his estranged wife Brenda had two children, Christopher and Joyce, in Johnson's custody. After an argument in which Brenda said Johnson threatened to kill the children, Christopher was hospitalized with insecticide poisoning and recovered. Weeks later, Joyce was hospitalized for a urinary infection and prescribed a liquid antibiotic; days after that, Johnson gave Joyce a teaspoon of white liquid while sending Christopher out of the room, and Christopher testified it smelled like bug poison. Joyce became violently ill and died; doctors found she had ingested organophosphate poison. Johnson denied wrongdoing and claimed he had merely sprayed insecticide in the house for a bug problem. The jury convicted Johnson of first-degree murder, and he appealed, arguing the judge should have instructed the jury that specific intent to kill was required and that lesser offenses were possible.