The following excerpt is from People of Territory of Guam v. Aguon, 21 F.3d 1115 (9th Cir. 1994):
Under Guam law, murder--as opposed to aggravated murder--committed under extreme mental or emotional disturbance is mitigated to manslaughter. Territory of Guam v. Quichocho, 973 F.2d 723, 725 (9th Cir.1992), cert. denied 113 S.Ct. 1014 (1993). While explaining that manslaughter required the defendant to show the existence and reasonableness of extreme mental or emotional disturbance by a preponderance of the evidence, the district judge mistakenly told the jury that the same burden of proof applied to the question of Aguon's guilt or innocence on the manslaughter charge. Aguon contends that the judge's first attempt to correct the error compounded it by repeating the erroneous summary of the burden of proof without adequately specifying where the error lay. He further argues that the mistakes in the manslaughter instructions confused the jury as to the proper standard to apply when considering his claims of self-defense and intoxication.
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