What is the difference between homicide and murder? If there isn't any, why use both words? Why is it even there?
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ANSWERS: 2
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Homicide can refer to the unintentional killing of another human while murder implies intent to kill.
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Homicide is merely the act of killing a human. It is not necessarily a crime. Murder is a legal conclusion. It is a certain type of illegal homicide. For example, when a medical examiner determines cause of death, they may determine that it was homicide, which only means that the person was killed by another. That does not necessarily mean that the killing of the person was murder. The person may have been killed during self-defense. The killing may have been an accident. You have may have heard the term "justifiable homicide" before? This simply means that a person was killed (hence homicide) but it is not a crime (e.g. manslaughter or murder) because there was a legal justification for the killing. The word homicide comes from the root "hom," which is derived from homo sapien (or human), and the suffix "cide" refers to the act of killing. Similarly, the term suicide comes from the latin root "sui" which means self, and "cide" which is the act of killing.
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