Potential Liability: Angela and Trevor are going to jail. Dwight too?
Not even Rainn Wilson’s recent video could keep us from watching this week’s episode, “The Target,” which featured a murder-for-hire plot, a giant comment-card pyramid, and Dwight’s pixelated genitalia. Yikes, indeed.
Angela has discovered that her husband, The Senator, is having an affair with Oscar. She does not react well and enlists (who else?) Dwight to procure the services of Trevor, a hapless wannabe killer for-hire. Spoiler alert: Trevor does not kill Oscar. In fact, Trevor does not even maim Oscar. This is in part due to Trevor’s incompetence, in part due to Oscar’s obvious self-defense training, and in part due to Dwight’s last-minute intervention to prevent Oscar from being knee-capped. Oscar is unharmed, but that is not going to stop Angela and Trevor from going to prison, and possibly Dwight, too.
Pennsylvania’s criminal code outlaws murder and assault. The state judicial code contains sentencing guidelines and identifies aggravating circumstances that can lead to a harsher sentence, including the fact that someone paid, or was paid, to kill another. Angela ultimately backed off killing Oscar and merely wanted him crippled, but either way, she and Trevor are going to prison for conspiracy and the actual attack on Oscar.
But what about Dwight? He knew of Angela’s intent from the beginning. He introduced her to Trevor. It was only in the moments before the actual attack that he took affirmative steps to protect Oscar. He’s guilty of conspiracy, right? Maybe not. The state criminal code offers a renunciation defense if the individual “thwarts the success of the conspiracy under circumstances manifesting a complete and voluntary renunciation of his criminal intent.”
It’s a close one, but we’re going to acquit Dwight, if for no other reason than the show really, really needs him. The episode’s final scene with Dwight, Angela, and Toby is all the evidence we need of that. Red-vining?!?!?
