When one commits the crime of murder in a single state of the United States, does he also violate a federal law against murder, or does it only become a federal crime if the murderer crosses state lines and commits murder in multiple states?
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Many of the federal laws against murder involve the murder of a federal official, such as the President or a postal worker (or certain close family members of federal officials). In those cases, the murder is both a state offense and a federal offense.
There are also other federal murder offenses that do not involve interstate activity.
Many of these involve murders on federal property (such as military based, inside federal buildings, in federal parks, etc.) or on Indian Reservations. These are also state law crimes except for murder on Indian Reservations in cases where state courts don't have jurisdiction. It is also a federal crime on ships that are navigable waters that are within a state's boundaries that are also U.S. waters (e.g. on a riverboat on the Ohio or Mississippi Rivers).
The list also includes: murder committed to try to influence the outcome of a federal court case, a murder committed during a bank robbery, a murder related to rape, child molestation, or the sexual exploitation of children, drug-related murders, murders by mail (even if the mail doesn't cross state lines), and terrorism related murders. Essentially all of these, when they happen within a U.S. state and not on an Indian Reservation (in circumstances that deprive the state courts of jurisdiction), are also state law crimes.
Indeed, crossing state lines and committing murders in multiple states does not necessarily make a murder a federal crime. If a shooter in Nebraska shoots and kills someone across the state line in Kansas, it is not necessarily a federal crime, although it could be prosecuted as murder in either Nebraska or Kansas. If a serial killer kills one person in each state and kills a new person each week, in crimes that are otherwise unrelated and do not involve kidnapping or bank robbery or drug dealing, that is not necessarily a federal crime.
Generally speaking, only the federal crime of murder for hire has an interstate aspect (from the link):
If the murder occurred by crossing state lines or using communication methods, including telephones, mail, or internet, then a murder for hire could be a federal murder crime.
A non-commercial murder with interstate facts is not generally a federal crime.
ohwilleke
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