University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform Volume 52 | Issue 3 2019 The nnoI cent Villain: Involuntary Manslaughter by Text Charles Adside III University of Michigan Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mjlr Part of the Communications Law Commons, Criminal Law Commons, and the Internet Law Commons Recommended Citation Charles Adside III, The Innocent Villain: Involuntary Manslaughter by Text, 52 U. Mich. J. L. Reform 731 (2019). Available at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mjlr/vol52/iss3/5 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform at University of Michigan Law School Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform by an authorized editor of University of Michigan Law School Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. THE INNOCENT VILLAIN: INVOLUNTARY MANSLAUGHTER BY TEXT Charles Adside III* 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.