## Facts

- George J. Ambro and his wife, Ruth Ambro, married in 1974 and had two daughters; the marriage deteriorated over several years.
- By late 1984 and early 1985, Ambro suspected Ruth of infidelity based on her behavior, including late nights away from home and other changes he viewed as suspicious.
- On March 20, 1985, during marital counseling, Ruth told Ambro she no longer loved him and intended to divorce him; Ambro later attempted suicide.
- Ruth consulted a lawyer on March 26 and planned to sign dissolution papers on March 29.
- On March 28, after putting the children to bed, the couple argued in the kitchen while Ambro was drying knives.
- During the argument, Ruth allegedly made statements including that the children were not his, that she would take the children so he would never see them again, that she had been unfaithful, and that she wanted him to kill her.
- Ambro stabbed Ruth in the heart with a kitchen knife, killing her; he later told investigators he had no recollection of the stabbing.
- A jury convicted Ambro of murder, and he was sentenced to 20 years’ imprisonment.
- The trial court refused Ambro’s request for a jury instruction on voluntary manslaughter based on serious provocation.

## Issues

1. Whether the evidence, viewed most favorably to the defendant, supported giving a voluntary manslaughter instruction based on a “sudden and intense passion resulting from serious provocation.”
2. Whether the alleged provocation could be found legally adequate when it consisted largely of verbal statements occurring as the culmination of prior marital turmoil.
3. Whether the refusal to instruct the jury on voluntary manslaughter required reversal of the murder conviction.

## Decision

- The appellate court reversed the murder conviction and remanded for a new trial.
- The court held the evidence was sufficient to permit a rational jury to find serious provocation and heat of passion, requiring an instruction on voluntary manslaughter.
- The trial court’s refusal to give the requested lesser-offense instruction was reversible error because it removed from the jury a supported mitigation theory.

## Legal Principles

- A defendant is entitled to a lesser-offense instruction when there is some evidence from which a jury could rationally find the elements of the lesser offense, viewed in the light most favorable to the defendant.
- Under Illinois law at the time, homicide could be mitigated from murder to voluntary manslaughter if committed under a sudden and intense passion resulting from serious provocation by the victim and before the passion had time to cool.
- Although “mere words” traditionally are insufficient provocation, adequacy may be assessed in context; a jury may consider whether verbal statements, as the culmination of a series of adverse marital events (including accusations about paternity, threats concerning children, and admissions of infidelity), constitute serious provocation.
- When evidence could support heat-of-passion mitigation, the question of serious provocation is for the jury, not the trial judge, to resolve as a matter of law.

## Conclusion

Because the evidence could support a finding that Ambro acted in a sudden and intense passion caused by serious provocation arising from the cumulative marital breakdown and the final confrontation, the jury should have been instructed on voluntary manslaughter; the murder conviction was therefore reversed and the case remanded for a new trial.


People v. Ambro, 153 Ill. App. 3d 1, 505 N.E.2d 381 (Ill. App. Ct. 2d Dist. 1987)