## Facts

- Gustav Dorazio, a brewery worker and former heavyweight boxer, and Albert Blomeyer, a co-worker, belonged to rival unions competing to represent brewery employees.
- On the day of the killing, Dorazio made threats directed at employees circulating a union-representation petition, including statements that he would send circulators “home in an ambulance” and “in an undertaker’s wagon.”
- Later that afternoon, Blomeyer had been obtaining petition signatures and had consumed several beers at a brewery tap room.
- As Blomeyer left the plant with two co-workers, Dorazio emerged from behind a pillar, followed, overtook the group, and began striking Blomeyer with his fists.
- Blomeyer ran into a brewery building; Dorazio chased him inside and continued a severe beating, including repeated blows while Blomeyer was on the floor; Dorazio also struck bystanders who attempted to intervene.
- Medical evidence attributed death to a fractured skull and brain injuries consistent with blows from fists rather than an accidental fall.
- Dorazio claimed Blomeyer attacked first and that Blomeyer’s head injury resulted from a fall; he argued he used only bare hands and that the incident was, at most, an unintended fatal assault.

## Issues

1. Whether the evidence was sufficient to prove malice supporting second-degree murder where the defendant used only his fists.
2. Whether malice may be inferred from the manner and circumstances of a brutal fist assault, including prior threats and pursuit of the victim.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania affirmed the judgment of sentence for second-degree murder.
- The court held the jury could find Dorazio intentionally inflicted a brutal beating under circumstances establishing malice.
- The court rejected a categorical rule that fists cannot support an inference of malice; the manner of use, severity, and surrounding circumstances controlled.
- The court deferred to the jury’s resolution of conflicts between the Commonwealth’s witnesses and Dorazio’s account.
- The court declined to reduce the homicide to manslaughter, finding the evidence inconsistent with legally adequate provocation or heat of passion.

## Legal Principles

- Malice for murder includes not only intent to kill, but also extreme recklessness and a depraved disregard for human life, shown through “wickedness of disposition,” cruelty, and disregard of social duty.
- Malice may be inferred from circumstantial evidence, including the nature and manner of an assault and the defendant’s conduct before and during the killing.
- Use of a traditional deadly weapon is not required; a defendant’s fists can support an inference of malice when used with sufficient violence, particularly against the head, and when resulting injuries show serious bodily harm or obvious risk of death.
- Prior threats and hostile motive may support an inference that an attack reflected settled malice rather than a sudden quarrel.
- Appellate review does not reweigh credibility where the Commonwealth’s evidence, if believed, proves the elements of the offense.

## Conclusion

The court sustained a second-degree murder conviction based on proof that a former boxer delivered a prolonged, violent fist beating after earlier threats during a labor dispute; the circumstances allowed the jury to infer malice despite the absence of a conventional weapon.


Commonwealth v. Dorazio, 74 A.2d 125 (Pa. 1950)