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Michelle Carter's texts instructing her mentally ill online boyfriend to commit suicide offended the social moral code. But the law does not categorize all morally reprehensible behavior as criminal. Commonwealth v. Carter is unprecedented in manslaughter law because Carter was convicted on the theory that she was virtually present as opposed to physically present--at the crime scene. The court's reasoning is expansive, as the framework it employs is excessively vague and does not provide fair notice to the public of which actions constitute involuntary manslaughter. Disturbingly, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the trial court's logic. This Article concludes that a conviction based upon a virtual-presence theory is unconstitutional, as it is void-for-vagueness. Hypotheticals are provided to illustrate how the Carter framework is unworkable when applied to online relationships based on electronic communications. State legislatures, not courts, should regulate this area, providing clear rules on when electronic encouragement of suicide violates the law. States can consider a physical-presence requirement and prohibit prosecutions on this basis. Or, legislators can borrow from aiding and abetting principles to expand their special relationship statutes to include online relationships, creating a duty to report when encouraging another to commit suicide. In either case, the law will provide citizens with bright-line rules to forecast when electronic conduct is subject to criminal sanction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the Massachusetts Juvenile Court's ruling in the 2017 case Commonwealth v. Carter which deals with American criminal law, liability for physical harm, and the trial court's determination that defendant Michelle Carter was guilty of involuntary manslaughter for using text messages and telephone calls to encourage her long-distance boyfriend Conrad Roy to commit suicide. Carter's self-created duty and failure to act to prevent the suicide are examined.

The article discusses three British Court of Appeal cases dealing with murder, voluntary manslaughter, loss of control, and sufficient evidence. It examines the evidences of loss of control in the cases which are reportedly insufficient that led the courts to dismiss the appeals. Also explored are the rights of defendants to seek to be excused from being held guilty for murder.

The article focuses on the decision of the U.S. Court case related to criminal law. The case discussed include State v. Stay on first-degree manslaughter predicated on fifth-degree assault does not require proof that death or great bodily harm was reasonably foreseeable and State v. Poehler on reasonable suspicion for stop when officer observes driver not wearing seat belt under Fourth Amendments.