Hamlet Guilty Conviction Analysis

In criminal law, a guilty conviction means that the defendant has been found beyond any reasonable doubt to be guilty of the crime. In cases of homicide not all of them are considered crimes the only case when it is regarded as a "not guilty" is the plaintiff proves beyond any reasonable doubt that it was a self-defense act that led to death. This means that the murder was not premeditated, intentional, followed by malice aforethought to kill an individual. In Shakespeare’s Hamlet follows the young Prince Hamlet who returns home to bury his father but later learns that he was murdered hence starts a long plot to exert revenge on his father’s killer. Filled with anger Prince Hamlet seeks to find his father's killer and from his research, he finds that Claudius is responsible for killing King …show more content…
Hamlet's intent, in this case, was to revenge his father's death by killing Claudius it is only that he got the wrong victim which means he committed murder. Therefore hamlet is guilty of killing Polonius. If it were not for his need to revenge, he would not have seen the need to draw the sword and stub anyone who was behind the curtains meaning this was something he had been thinking about for a while (Felperin 56). Hamlet choosing to draw his sword and kill “Claudius” shows the deliberation to kill. According to the United States homicide law premeditation, deliberation and the will to kill are vital factors in differentiating between first and second-degree murder. Hamlets intention to kill was seen in how fast he moved to kill the individual behind the curtain without confirming if he was the right victim (Act3.4.22). His last act after seeing it was Polonius adds to his guilt, as usually, a person would ask for forgiveness but Hamlet abused Polonius for being at the wrong time and place adding more to his guilt (Act