32 A.3d 613 (2011)
In this appeal, we consider whether it is possible, as a matter of law, to be convicted as an accomplice to third-degree murder.
The complete factual background is somewhat cumbersome. For present purposes, it is enough to say the Commonwealth presented evidence that the victim was lured to an apartment complex, where he was ambushed, shot, and mortally wounded. Appellant participated, with others, in orchestrating the events, but he did not shoot the victim.1
For his role, Appellant was charged with, among other offenses, murder of the third degree. See 18 Pa.C.S. § 2502(c). As he did not physically perpetrate the homicide, the Commonwealth relied upon accomplice theory, which is codified in Section 306 of the Crimes Code along with other complicity-based accountability principles. See id. § 306 (entitled “Liability for conduct of another; complicity” and establishing the terms of legal accountability for the conduct of another). The matter proceeded to a bench trial, and a verdict of guilt ensued.
On appeal, Appellant argued that there is no rational legal theory to support accomplice liability for third-degree murder. He rested his position on the following syllogism: accomplice liability attaches only where the defendant intends to facilitate or promote an underlying offense; third-degree murder is an unintentional killing committed with malice; therefore, to adjudge a criminal defendant guilty of third-degree murder as an accomplice would be to accept that the accused intended to aid an unintentional act, which is a logical impossibility.
The Superior Court did not directly refute either of the two premises underlying Appellant’s argument,2 but it differed with the conclusion. Initially, the court recognized that the complicity statute defines “accomplice” in terms of intentional promotion or facilitation of “the commission of the offense.” Id. § 306(c)(1). Nevertheless, the court highlighted the following statutory prescription pertaining to the requisite mens rea (or mental state):
When causing a particular result is an element of an offense, an accomplice in the conduct causing such result is an accomplice in the commission of that offense, if he acts with the kind of culpability, if any, with respect to that result that is sufficient for the commission of the offense.
Id. § 306(d). As the “kind of culpability” predicate to third-degree murder entails malice, see, e.g., Commonwealth v. Santos, 583 Pa. 96, 101-02, 876 A.2d 360, 363 (2005),3 the court reasoned that, “[i]f one participates in a criminal act, which also demonstrates malice, and if a life is taken, one can be convicted of ... third-degree murder vicariously.” Roebuck, No. 1555 WDA 2007, slip op. at 14-15. In effect, the intermediate court held that complicity theory applies in third-degree murder scenarios — even if homicide was not the intended underlying crime — where the intentional acts demonstrate a disregard for human life amounting to malice. Accord Commonwealth v. Flanagan, 578 Pa. 587, 594 n. 2, 607, 610 n. 13, 854 A.2d 489, 493 n. 2, 501, 503 n. 13 (2004).4 Upon the appellate review of this and other claims, the judgment of sentence was affirmed.
This discretionary appeal was allowed to resolve Appellant’s legal challenge to the application of complicity theory to murder of the third degree. See Commonwealth v. Roebuck, 606 Pa. 290, 291, 997 A.2d 1150, 1150 (2010) (per curiam). Our scope of review of such matters is plenary, and our standard of review is de novo. See, e.g., Commonwealth v. Cousin, 585 Pa. 287, 294, 888 A.2d 710, 714 (2005).
Presently, Appellant maintains that accomplice liability for third-degree murder is a legal anomaly in view of his impossibility syllogism. In passing, Appellant observes that Section 306 of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code was derived from the Model Penal Code. See Model Penal Code § 2.06 (1962) (the “MPC” or the “Code”). Without developing how the Code actually treats accomplice liability, Appellant’s brief segues into a discussion of a series of Superior Court opinions, as well as decisions from other jurisdictions, disapproving convictions based on grounds of logical and/or legal impossibility.5 Most of these cases involve criminal attempt and conspiracy, and Appellant acknowledges that the accomplice theory is distinct. Nevertheless, he urges that the same impossibility rationale should apply. See Brief for Appellant at 18-19 (“[T]he conclusion should be the same, since accomplice liability only attaches when one intends to aid another person in a crime, and, if such crime is third degree murder, the person aiding will be furthering an unintentional crime, which is logically impossible.”).
Appellant’s most direct support derives from his citation to a subsequently disapproved plurality decision of the New Hampshire Supreme Court. See id. at 21 (citing State v. Etzweiler, 125 N.H. 57, 480 A.2d 870, 874 (1984) (plurality) (reasoning that “an accomplice’s liability ought not extend beyond the criminal purposes that [the accomplice] shares”), superseded by N.H.Rev.Stat. Ann. § 626:8 (West 2001), and disapproved by State v. Anthony, 151 N.H. 492, 861 A.2d 773 (2004)). In his discussion, he also alludes to a concurring opinion authored by former Justice Souter of the United States Supreme Court, who, at the time, was a Justice of the state supreme court. In this responsive opinion, Justice Souter criticized the Model Penal Code’s description of the culpability requisite to accomplice liability — after which Section 306(d) of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code was modeled — as he believed that it “fails to give any comprehensible, let alone fair, notice of intended effect[.]” Etzweiler, 480 A.2d at 877 (Souter, J., concurring).
Finally, Appellant references the dissent in a decision of this Court which discussed conspiracy to commit third-degree murder. See Commonwealth v. Weimer, 602 Pa. 33, 41-53, 977 A.2d 1103, 1107-15 (2009) (Todd, J., joined by Saylor, J.). Appellant suggests that this responsive opinion also confirms his impossibility rationale. See id. at 48, 977 A.2d at 1112 (“[T]o be guilty of conspiracy to commit third-degree murder, an individual would have to intend to commit an unintentional killing, a logical impossibility.”).
In reply and in relevant part, the Commonwealth posits that accomplice liability readily pertains to murder of the third degree. Consistent with the Superior Court’s reasoning, the Commonwealth explains that it is the shared criminal intent motivating the underlying conduct (here, designing to stage a very dangerous altercation) which establishes the requisite criminal culpability. The Commonwealth offers, as an illustration, the Superior Court’s decision in Commonwealth v. Kimbrough, 872 A.2d 1244 (Pa.Super.2005) (en banc) (undertaking sufficiency review and upholding a judgment of sentence for murder of the third degree based on accomplice liability). See Brief for Appellee at 24-26 (“It is obvious from the Superior Court’s decision in Kimbrough that because the defendant, acting with the requisite malice, had put in motion the events that led to the victim’s killing, he was legally responsible for the actions of the individual who actually fired the gun that killed the victim.”). According to the Commonwealth, it is both rational and sensible to hold one who aids another in malicious conduct to account to the same degree as the principal for foreseeable consequences of the wrongful actions. See id. at 23-24 (“If it was not necessarily the principal actor’s intention to kill anyone and yet he can still be found guilty of third-degree murder ..., why is it that his accomplice cannot be guilty of the same thing when both of them engaged in the same plan to act violently?”).6
At the outset, it certainly is possible for a state legislature to employ complicity theory to establish legal accountability on the part of an accomplice for foreseeable but unintended results caused by a principal. Indeed, this was the express design of the American Law Institute’s widely influential Model Penal Code.
To provide appropriate context in considering the MPC’s treatment of complicity theory, it is helpful to review some of the Code’s core theoretical underpinnings. Also impacting on this discussion, the MPC does not employ the term “malice” in its treatment of the crime of murder, but rather, expresses the concept as “reckless[ness] under circumstances manifesting extreme indifference to the value of human life.” Model Penal Code § 210.2(1)(b).7 To streamline the discourse, and particularly since Appellant’s impossibility logic is grounded on the presence of unintended consequences flowing from an intentional act — and thus extends to any crime in which the mens rea pertaining to a necessary result is recklessness — much of the discussion below is framed in terms of recklessness.8
In addressing the terms of the Model Penal Code, it is important to bear in mind that the Code employs an elements approach to substantive criminal law, which recognizes that a single offense definition may require different culpable mental states for each objective offense element. See id. § 2.02, Explanatory Note (“The requirement of culpability applies to each ‘material element’ of the crime.”).9 The MPC further narrows mens rea analysis by pruning from the lexicon a plethora of common-law culpability terms, leaving four core terms. See id. § 2.02(1) (indicating, subject to one express exception, that “a person is not guilty of an offense unless he acted purposely, knowingly, recklessly or negligently, as the law may require”); see also Robinson & Grall, Element Analysis, 35 Stan. L.Rev. at 692-93.
Conceptually, the MPC also recognizes three objective categories of offense elements — conduct, attendant circumstances, and result. See Model Penal Code § 2.02, cmt. 1, at 229. The Code frequently distinguishes among these offense-element categories in its various prescriptions regarding which of the four levels of culpability must be established for any given offense element. See generally id. at 229-30 (“The question of which level of culpability suffices to establish liability must be addressed separately with respect to each material element, and will be resolved either by the particular definition of the offense or the general provisions of [Section 2.02].”).10
The Model Penal Code has had its share of detractors, and, certainly, it does not provide perfect formulations. For example, as relevant to Appellant’s arguments, the Code has been criticized for failing to provide an adequate description and overlay relating the four levels of culpability (purposeful, knowing, reckless, negligent) to the objective element categories (conduct, attendant circumstances, result) in the context of particular offense elements. See, e.g., Robinson & Grall, Element Analysis, 35 Stan. L.Rev. at 706-07. Such criticism has been leveled in the accomplice-liability setting. See, e.g., id. at 739 (“The greatest flaw in the Model Penal Code provision [directed to accomplice liability], and those provisions modeled after it, is their failure to specify all of the culpability requirements of the substantive offense that the accomplice must satisfy.”). We bear these observations in mind in proceeding to address the Code’s treatment of complicity theory.
The legal accountability of accomplices for the conduct of others is treated in 2.06 of the Code. See Model Penal Code § 2.06(2)(c) (“A person is legally accountable for the conduct of another person when ... he is an accomplice of such other person in the commission of the offense”). Two material passages follow, developing the meaning of the term “accomplice” and the requisite mens rea, as relevant to the present case:
(3) A person is an accomplice of another person in the commission of an offense if ... with the purpose of promoting or facilitating the commission of the offense, he ... aids or agrees or attempts to aid such other person in planning or committing it[.]
(4) When causing a particular result is an element of an offense, an accomplice in the conduct causing such result is an accomplice in the commission of that offense if he acts with the kind of culpability, if any, with respect to that result that is sufficient for the commission of the offense.
Id. § 2.06(3), (4).
Section 2.06(4) thus prescribes that an accomplice may be held legally accountable where he is an “accomplice in the conduct” — or, in other words, aids another in planning or committing the conduct with the purpose of promoting or facilitating it — and acts with recklessness (i.e., the “kind of culpability ... sufficient for the commission of” a reckless-result offense).11
To the extent any aspect of this accountability scheme is unclear, ample clarification is provided in the explanatory note and commentary. As a threshold matter, the commentary explains that the term “commission of the offense,” as used in Section 2.06(3), focuses on the conduct, not the result. See id. § 2.06, cmt. 6(b), at 310 (“Subsection 3(a) requires that the actor have the purpose of promoting or facilitating the commission of the offense, i.e., that he have as his conscious objective the bringing about of conduct that the Code has declared to be criminal[.]” (emphasis added)).12 This diffuses any impression that an accomplice must always intend results essential to the completed crime. See Wheeler, 772 P.2d at 103 (explaining that the “ ‘intent to promote or facilitate the commission of the offense’ ... does not include an intent that death occur even though the underlying crime ... has death as an essential element” (citation and quotation marks omitted)). The commentary then points to the fourth subsection as supplying the essential culpability requirement, as follows:
One who solicits an end, or aids or agrees to aid in its achievement, is an accomplice in whatever means may be employed, insofar as they constitute or commit an offense fairly envisaged in the purposes of the association. But when a wholly different crime has been committed, thus involving conduct not within the conscious objectives of the accomplice, he is not liable for it unless the case falls within the specific terms of Subsection (4).
Model Penal Code § 2.06, cmt. 6(b), at 311 (emphasis added). According to the commentary, the purport of the fourth subsection is to hold the accomplice accountable for contributing to the conduct to the degree his culpability equals what is required to support liability of a principal actor.13
Again, we acknowledge the criticisms that the Model Penal Code lacks clarity, particularly in the arena of accomplice liability. Most of the examples referenced by commentators, however, entail more nuanced factual scenarios. See, e.g., Robinson & Grall, Element Analysis, 35 Stan. L.Rev. at 740-41. To the degree courts and commentators have suggested that the MPC formulation is unduly ambiguous in imposing legal accountability of accomplices for unintended consequences of reckless conduct, we respectfully disagree. We also differ with the few decisions which suggest that the Code’s scheme dictates that an accomplice’s liability cannot extend to results beyond those within the contemplation of shared criminal purposes. See, e.g., Etzweiler, 480 A.2d at 874. Indeed, to our knowledge, the only jurisdictions which had credited such position have subsequently corrected it. See Anthony, 861 A.2d at 775 (reflecting the New Hampshire Supreme Court’s explanation that its Etzweiler decision was in error, inter alia, because it overlooked the MPC commentary).14
For the above reasons, at least under the regime of the Model Penal Code, holding an accomplice criminally liable for a result requiring a mental state of recklessness is not theoretically impossible, as Appellant asserts. To the contrary, it is precisely the norm. Accord Riley, 60 P.3d at 221 (“With respect to offenses that require proof of a particular result, the government must prove that the accomplice acted with the culpable mental state that applies to that result, as specified in the underlying statute.”).15
As Appellant indicates (albeit lacking the above elaboration), Section 306 of the Pennsylvania Crimes Code derives from the Model Penal Code. See 18 Pa.C.S. § 306, cmt. Furthermore, the provisions of the Crimes Code establishing legal accountability for accomplice conduct are materially identical to the corresponding terms of Section 2.06 of the MPC in all relevant respects. Compare id. § 306(c), (d), with Model Penal Code § 2.06(3), (4).
We recognize that the Crimes Code does not contain the wealth of collateral explanatory material which accompanies the Model Penal Code, including the latter’s extensive notes and commentaries. Nevertheless, we believe the text of the Pennsylvania statute is clear enough. In terms identical to those of Section 2.06 of the MPC, Section 306(d) of the Crimes Code directs the focus, for result-based elements, to the level of culpability required of a principal. See 18 Pa.C.S. § 306(d). See generally Riley, 60 P.3d at 214 (explaining that a “great majority” of judicial decisions have followed the MPC in holding that an accomplice must not necessarily intend to cause the prohibited result (citations omitted)). In the present factual scenario, the purport is to avoid elevating a recklessness-oriented culpability requirement to a purposeful one relative to an accomplice. Accord Anthony, 861 A.2d at 775 (“[I]f the offense’s mental state with respect to the result is something less than purposeful, the State need only establish the lesser mens rea on the part of the accomplice to prove him or her guilty of the offense.”). The policy basis for such treatment is readily discernable,16 and a homicide committed with the degree of recklessness predicate to murder provides a paradigmatic example.
Appellant’s position garners its only ostensible strength from his attempt to read Section 306(c) in isolation. We are obliged, however, to read statutes in a manner giving effect to all of their provisions, see 1 Pa.C.S. § 1922(2), which, in the present case, includes Section 306(d).17 Moreover, to the extent there is any tension between Sections 306(c) and (d), the latter is the more specific term relative to offenses containing result-based elements; therefore, it controls. See id. § 1933 (relating the rule of construction that the particular controls over the general); cf. Model Penal Code § 2.06, cmt. 7, at 321-22 (explaining, with regard to the Code’s analogues to Sections 306(c) and (d), that the latter functions as “a desirable extension of accomplice liability beyond the principles stated in” the former).
We turn now to Appellant’s citations to judicial decisions involving attempt and conspiracy. In this regard, we appreciate that many of these hold that persons cannot attempt or conspire to commit offenses that require unintended results. See supra note 5. It is beyond the scope of this opinion for this Court to address whether such decisions are consistent with Pennsylvania statutory law.18 Here, we observe only that these lines of cases are materially distinguishable, given that the culpability requirements are different. See, e.g., Palmer, 964 P.2d at 528 (“[C]onspiracy, attempt, and complicity are distinct legal principles with different requirements for mental culpability.”).19
To commit the crime of criminal attempt, a person must act with “intent to commit a specific crime.” 18 Pa.C.S. § 901(a) (emphasis added). Therefore, in the attempt setting, the mens rea level of “intentionally” attaches to the result (for example, a homicide).20 This is materially different from the accomplice scenario — in which the required culpability derives from the mental state required for liability of a principal and may be of a lesser degree. See supra part I.
The conspiracy decisions of other courts referenced by Appellant likewise accept that conspiracy encompassed the intent to cause a particular result, cast in terms of the “object.”21 Again, this focus on result serves as the material distinction from the accomplice scenario, where the focus is on the underlying conduct. See supra parts I and II.
The differences between attempt and conspiracy, on the one hand, and complicity on the other, are reflected, amply, in the decisions from other courts, including several of those cited by Appellant. Most, if not all, have held that a defendant can be convicted as an accomplice to an offense encompassing recklessness as the mental state pertaining to the result.22 Again, accomplice liability does not require the defendant to have the conscious objective to cause a particular result when such an outcome is an element of the offense.
This point was cogently made by the Connecticut Supreme Court in Foster. There, the appellant had argued that accomplice to criminally negligent homicide was not a cognizable offense under Connecticut law, because, like attempt or conspiracy liability, such a crime would require finding that the defendant intended to aid an unintended result — a logical impossibility.23 The Foster court disagreed, reasoning, in relevant part, as follows:
[T]o be guilty of attempt, a defendant’s conscious objective must be to cause the result which would constitute the substantive crime. A person cannot attempt to commit a crime which requires that an unintended result occur, such as involuntary manslaughter, because it is logically impossible for one to intend to bring about an unintended result. Similarly, to be guilty of conspiracy, the defendant, upon entering an agreement, must intend that his conduct achieve the requisite criminal result. When the substantive crime requires an unintended result, a person cannot conspire to commit that crime because it is logically impossible to agree to achieve a specific result unintentionally.
Contrary to the [appellant’s] assertions, and unlike attempt or conspiratorial liability, accessorial liability does not require that a defendant act with the conscious objective to cause the result described by a statute.
[The accomplice statute] merely requires that a defendant have the mental state required for the commission of a crime while intentionally aiding another.
Foster, 522 A.2d at 282-83 (citations and footnotes omitted; emphasis in original).
Consistent with the Model Penal Code, the Pennsylvania Crimes Code, and the weight of the authorities, the court thus held that a defendant may be held liable for a criminally negligent act under complicity theory “if he has the requisite culpable mental state for the commission of the substantive offense, and he intentionally aids another in the crime.” Id. at 284.
In light of the above, it is apparent that the first premise of Appellant’s impossibility syllogism embodies the erroneous proposition that the culpability requirement for accomplice liability is necessarily tied to a result (here, the killing). Again, Section 306(d) provides differently. The statute’s reach simply is not confined to substantive crimes requiring a specific intention to bring about a particular result. Accord id. at 282. For offenses where a principal actor need not intend the result, it is also not necessary for the accomplice to do so.24
In summary, a conviction for murder of the third degree is supportable under complicity theory where the Commonwealth proves the accomplice acted with the culpable mental state required of a principal actor, namely, malice. In other words, the Pennsylvania Crimes Code legally, logically, and rationally imposes accomplice liability for depraved heart murder.
The judgment of the Superior Court is affirmed and jurisdiction is relinquished.
Justice ORIE MELVIN did not participate in the consideration or decision of this case.
Chief Justice CASTILLE, Justices BAER, TODD, and McCAFFERY join the opinion.
Justice EAKIN files a concurring opinion, in which Chief Justice CASTILLE joins.
I agree with the majority that, as a matter of law, one can be convicted of being an accomplice to third degree murder. The majority opinion recognizes the flaw in the second premise of Appellant’s syllogism, which posits that third degree murder is an unintentional killing committed with malice. Third degree murder is not by definition an unintentional killing; it is a malicious killing without proof that the specific result intended from the actions of the killer was the death of the victim. A conviction for third degree murder only means the Commonwealth did not prove the defendant acted with a specific intent to kill. See Commonwealth v. Meadows, 567 Pa. 344, 787 A.2d 312, 317 (2001) (quoting Commonwealth v. Young, 561 Pa. 34, 748 A.2d 166, 175 (1999) (“[T]o convict a defendant for third degree murder, the jury need not consider whether the defendant had a specific intent to kill, nor make any finding with respect thereto.”)).
As Appellant’s syllogism is based on a false premise, his argument fails. Indeed, an accomplice to third degree murder does not intend to aid an unintentional murder; he intends to aid a malicious act which results in a killing. Suppose an accomplice hands a gun to the principal and says “shoot that victim — I don’t care if he dies or not, but shoot him.” The principal shoots the victim in the leg, but the victim dies — it is classic third degree murder, there being no proof of specific intent to kill, but a clearly malicious act regardless of the consequences. The same logic that enables a murder charge against the principal binds the accomplice as well — both committed an intentional malicious act that resulted in the death of another, and both are guilty of the murder charge that follows.
Accordingly, I respectfully concur in result.
Chief Justice CASTILLE joins this opinion.