Content Warning: Suicide
As previously discussed, Dan White expressed intent to kill more than two people in 1978. This implies a deliberate choice to commit murder. Though the jury at the time decided he did not have the ability to premeditate with malice aforethought it is highly unlikely that one would plan to kill people without malice aforethought… And there was premeditation.
Therefore, it is important for the sake of understanding the true severity of his crime as well as his mentality and affect to consider the events after his release from prison that led to his suicide. After prison, Dan White expressed that he was finally realizing he could never return to the way things had been – that he would never truly be free. Though he briefly had hopes of moving his family to Ireland after a four-month trip on his own, it failed because his wife and children and lives in San Francisco and not enough money to leave. Once again he found money to be a worry as he couldn’t hold a steady job being so notorious.
Eventually, Dan White committed suicide. The lasting impression of his friends was that he was constantly looking over his shoulder waiting for someone to retaliate and kill him. Ultimately, those who knew him agreed it was not guilt that ever bothered him but rather that he wasn’t welcomed back into his old life after “doing his time”, and fear that someone was going to retaliate. This is said that it also drove him "nuts".
For 13 March.
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