A seemingly normal person goes and dismember his colleague after things doesn’t go his way when he when in for a scam. Why is it not 1st degree murder?
Because with initial charges, when you've got pretty solid probable cause for intent (2nd degree), there's no reason to take any risk at the probable cause hearing with premeditation (1st degree); if you've got evidence that you think can get a conviction on that as you investigate, upgrading charges is easy.
You have to prove the accused went there with the intention to kill. He could have gone with the intention to talk about their debt situation, but then saw the victim and went red with rage or something like that.
It's really, really hard to get prove exactly what someone was thinking. You need a very concrete piece of evidence that proves intent, just going somewhere is not going to be enough.
How about going there completely disguised, and pretending to go to a different floor in the building than Fahim? If he went there to talk to him, he wouldn't press a button in the elevator for a different apartment.
It'll probably be upgraded later when they finish their investigation. The priority now is keeping him in custody, and for that they may have to present evidence to a judge. So they're going with what they know they can prove right now.
