A lesser included offense instruction shall be given at any homicide trial whenever any facts are submitted to the trier of fact which would support such an offense pursuant to this chapter. The state and the defendant each have the separate right to request a lesser included offense instruction. The failure to request a lesser included offense instruction constitutes a waiver of the right to such an instruction.
S.D. Codified Laws § 22-16-20.2
Lesser included offense instruction
Applied in 4 court decisions — leading case State v. Babcock (2020)
Most recently applied in State v. Babcock (December 2020)
Source: SL 2005, ch 120, § 437.
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Official source: South Dakota Legislature. Reproduced from public-domain South Dakota statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.