State v. Westbrook

WYNN, Judge.

“ ‘Second-degree murder is defined as the unlawful killing of a human being with malice but without premeditation and deliberation.’ ” State v. Rick, 342 N.C. 91, 98, 463 S.E.2d 182, 186 (1995) (quoting State v. Phipps, 331 N.C. 427, 457-58, 418 S.E.2d 178, 194 (1992)). In this case, Defendant contends that the State failed to prove the element of malice to support a conviction of second-degree murder. Because the evidence showed that Defendant drove with an alcohol concentration of 0.156; sped seventy-five to eighty miles per hour in a forty-five miles per hour zone; traveled in…