Under Colorado law, manslaughter is a form of homicide that is less serious than murder. You commit manslaughter when:

• You recklessly cause the death of another person; or
• You intentionally cause or aid another person to commit suicide.

Under section 18-3-104 CRS, punishment for manslaughter can be anywhere from

• 2 to 6 years in prison (followed by 3 years mandatory parole) and
• a fine as high as $500,000, depending on the circumstances.

Fortunately, there are several defenses to Colorado manslaughter charges. These include showing that:

• The killing was accidental,
• You were acting in lawful self-defense,
• You were suffering from insanity,
• You were the victim of mistaken identification, or
• The police officers violated your rights.

The following table compares the elements and penalties for Colorado’s primary homicide crimes.

Crime	Code Section	Elements	Colorado Penalties
First Degree Murder	CRS 18-3-102	Intentional killing of another person with deliberation and premeditation. May also include felony murder, killing a peace officer, or causing death by extreme indifference.	Class 1 felony:  life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.
Second Degree Murder	CRS 18-3-103	Knowingly causing the death of another person without the premeditation required for first degree murder.	Class 2 felony:  16 to 48 years in prison and/or $5,000 to $1,000,000. If committed in the heat of passion, this is a class 3 felony:  4 to 12 years in prison.
Manslaughter	CRS 18-3-104	Recklessly causing the death of another person, or intentionally causing or aiding another person to commit suicide.	Class 4 felony:  2 to 6 years in prison and/or $2,000 to $500,000.
Criminally Negligent Homicide	CRS 18-3-105	Failure to perceive, through a gross deviation from the standard of reasonable care, a substantial and unjustifiable risk that death will result from your conduct.	Class 5 felony:  1 to 3 years in prison and/or $1,000 to $100,000.

To help you better understand the law, our Colorado criminal defense lawyers will discuss the following manslaughter topics:

• 1. Elements
• 2. Penalties
• 3. Defenses
• Additional Reading

1. Elements

For you to be convicted of manslaughter under Colorado Revised Statute 18-3-104(1), prosecutors must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you either:

• recklessly caused the death of another person or
• intentionally caused or aided another person to commit suicide.

To be guilty of reckless manslaughter, it is not necessary that you specifically intend to cause someone’s death.¹ Rather, it requires that you knowingly engage in conduct that creates a substantial and unjustifiable risk of causing death.² An example may be twirling a gun you know is loaded, and it accidentally goes off and kills someone.

To be guilty of manslaughter by aiding a suicide, you must have encouraged, assisted, or provided the means for the person to kill themself. If you actively performed the act that resulted in death, then you would instead face murder charges.³ However, there is an exception for medical caregivers who withhold care or provide medication in accordance with:

• An advanced medical directive,
• A medical durable power of attorney,
• A living will,
• A cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) directive.⁴

You are also not guilty of manslaughter if you are a medical caregiver with prescriptive authority – or authority to administer medication – who prescribes or administers medication for palliative care to a terminally ill patient with the consent of the terminally ill patient or their agent.⁵ However, this exception does not permit a medical caregiver to assist in a patient’s suicide.

Manslaughter vs. 2nd-Degree Murder

With second-degree murder, the killing is not premeditated, but you know that death is practically certain as a result of your conduct. The classic example is playing Russian Roulette: Even if you did not mean to kill a particular person, it was practically inevitable by your deliberate actions.

Second-degree murder also comprises “heat of passion” killings, like the one that results when you come home from work early and find your spouse in bed with someone else. In short, you killed because you were substantially provoked by something that would arouse passion in a reasonable person.

With manslaughter, your conduct is more reckless than intentional, which is why manslaughter is a less serious crime. Note that unlike many states, Colorado does not have separate “voluntary manslaughter” and “involuntary manslaughter” crimes. What many states define as voluntary manslaughter is second-degree murder in Colorado.

Manslaughter vs. Criminally Negligent Homicide

Meanwhile, criminally negligent homicide occurs when, through a gross deviation from the standard of reasonable care, you simply fail to perceive a substantial and unjustifiable risk of death and someone is killed as a result. Your conduct is not reckless like with manslaughter but instead just very careless. Therefore, manslaughter is a more serious crime than criminally negligent homicide.

For example, you have a gun that you forget is loaded, and you twirl it around. If it goes off accidentally, you would probably face criminally negligent homicide charges for acting negligently. Though if you knew the gun was loaded and chose to twirl it anyway, then you would probably face manslaughter charges for your reckless conduct.

2. Penalties

Under Colorado 18-3-104 C.R.S., manslaughter is a class 4 felony carrying:

• 2 to 6 years in prison and
• A fine of $2,000 to $500,000.

These are also the punishments for:

• vehicular homicide caused by reckless driving and
• criminally negligent homicide if the victim is disabled.

Note that manslaughter is one level less serious than heat of passion second-degree murder or vehicular homicide by DUI, which are class 3 felonies carrying four to 12 years in prison and $3,000 to $750,000 in fines.

Also note that manslaughter is one rung more serious than criminally negligent homicide of a non-disabled victim. This is typically a class 5 felony carrying one to three years in prison and $1,000 to $100,000 in fines.

3. Defenses

Here at Colorado Legal Defense Group, we have represented countless people charged with homicide crimes such as manslaughter. In our experience, the following five defenses have proven very effective with prosecutors, judges, and juries.

The Killing Was an Accident

If the killing was accidental and not the result of ignoring a substantial and unjustifiable risk of death, you are not guilty of manslaughter. Accidental killings include (but are not limited to):

• hunting accidents,
• auto accidents by sober drivers, and
• deaths due to unknown hazardous conditions in the home that do not result from deviations from a reasonable standard of care.

Typical evidence we rely on in these cases includes video surveillance and eyewitness accounts.

You Acted in Self-Defense / Defense of Others

In Colorado, you may legally use deadly physical force to defend yourself or someone else if:

1. You reasonably believe a lesser degree of force to be inadequate AND
2. You reasonably believe that:
   • You or another person is in imminent danger of great bodily injury or death; or
   • Someone else is about to use physical force during the commission of a burglary; or
   • Someone else is committing or appears to be about to commit, robbery or sexual assault;⁶; or
   • Someone has unlawfully entered your home and committed – or intends to commit — a crime in your home, and you reasonably believe that such person might use physical force against you or another occupant.⁷

If we can show that a reasonable person in your position would have acted the same way, criminal charges should not stand.⁸

You Suffered from Diminished Capacity / Insanity

Under Colorado law, you are considered insane when as a result of a mental disease or defect:

• You are incapable of distinguishing right from wrong concerning the crime with which you are charged, or
• You are unable to form a culpable mental state that is an essential element of a crime charged.

Simply suffering from a serious mental illness such as schizophrenia or bipolar disorder is not enough. You also cannot use the insanity defense if your diminished capacity resulted solely from voluntary intoxication.

A successful diminished capacity defense, therefore, requires a great deal of legwork as well as the testimony of medical experts to explain that you had no awareness of your actions at the time of a killing or were unable to understand the consequences.

You Are the Victim of Mistaken Identification

Manslaughter cases frequently turn on eyewitness testimony, yet even honest and well-meaning witnesses can make errors due to multiple factors.⁹ Therefore, many researchers consider eyewitness testimony inherently unreliable.¹⁰

Our experienced Colorado criminal defense attorneys have some proven techniques to counter unfavorable eyewitness testimony. These include (without limitation):

• Engaging a skilled “eyewitness identification expert” to explain to the jury how and why memory can be unreliable;
• Conducting vigorous interviews and cross-examination of witnesses;
• Challenging the procedures the police use for conducting lineups and photo spreads; and
• Using experienced private investigators to locate additional witnesses and uncover inconsistencies in the district attorney’s case.

There Was Police Misconduct

Police and prosecutors are subject to stringent rules and procedures in investigating and prosecuting crimes. If the police or the prosecutor messes up, we can move to exclude evidence obtained as a result.

Ways the police can violate your rights include (but are not limited to):

• Planting evidence or failing to maintain the chain of custody of evidence,
• Committing perjury,
• Obtaining a faulty search warrant,
• Contaminating the crime scene evidence,
• Improperly conducting police line-ups,
• Failing to read or observe your Miranda rights, or
• Conducting an illegal search and seizure in violation of your rights under the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Additional Reading

For more in-depth information, refer to these scholarly articles:

• (Wo)Manslaughter: Voluntary Manslaughter, Gender, and the Model Penal Code – Emory Law Journal.
• Are There Circumstances Other than Provocation which May Reduce Murder to Voluntary Manslaughter – Kentucky Law Journal.
• What Future for Voluntary Manslaughter? – The Journal of Criminal Law.
• Manslaughter and the Adequacy of Provocation: The Reasonableness of the Reasonable Man – University of Pennsylvania Law Review.
• The psychology and law of voluntary manslaughter: what can psychology research teach us about the “heat of passion” defense? – Behavior Decision Making.
• Some Provoking Aspects of Voluntary Manslaughter Law – Common Law World Review.

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