We tend to think differently of "killing" and "murder." The latter suggests pre-meditation, the former an uncontrolled fury.
I thought about this in my post on concealed carry, packing heat. I once lived in a mixed neighborhood and knew this black guy, one of my neighbors.
He told me of a time some years before, in St Louis, when he was held up at gunpoint by a young man, also black. "I felt completely helpless, at the mercy of this punk. I didn't know if he was going to pull the trigger or not. If you've never experienced it you have no idea. I wanted to kill him."
My neighbor later bought a pistol, a few actually, and carried concealed (and illegally) ever since. He said that on two occasions since he'd prevented an assault upon himself by a mere display of the weapons when in a threatening situation.
I am sure, tho, that he would have killed the kid who took his wallet and watch at the point of a gun.
I have had similar murderous impulses over the years.
Justifiable homicide? Perhaps. But who knows how a jury would decide.
Let me re-phrase the queston: would you - could you - kill in a white hot anger? Such as being held up at gunpoint or knifepoint? Or seeing a loved one abused or harmed by a maniac? Or a child in same situation?
OK, second situaution. If a really horrendous slob, a child rapist and murderer say, was sentenced to be executed, could you inject the lethal dose, or fire th fatal shot? (I think Utah still allows a firing squad?)
And finally: could you plot and carry out a premeditated murder? Say for revenge, or for money?