No. "Committed" is a past participle which, when combined with "had," forms a past perfect verb. "Committed" without the "had" would be past tense--"He committed murder." The past perfect is needed in your example because the action of committing the murder had to take place before the action of discovering, i.e. the murder had to take place before we could discover who the murderer is.
Best,
Clint
Clinton Atchley, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of English
Director, Master of Liberal Arts Program
Box 7652
Henderson State University
Arkadelphia, AR 71999
Phone: 870.230.5276
Email: [log in to unmask]
URL: http://www.hsu.edu/atchlec
________________________________
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar on behalf of Brad Johnston
Sent: Thu 7/24/2008 6:13 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Whom had committed the murder
Now, who versus whom. Although whom is phasing out of the language, it is alive and well in standardized tests of English usage. You'll find:
We finally discovered whom had committed the murder in the ballroom with the lead pipe.
Who, as the subjective case pronoun goes wherever I, we, he, she, and they can go. Whom, as the objective case pronoun, goes wherever me, us, him, her, and them can go. Try this: A who/whom sentence often implies a question. That question can be answered with either he or him (she or her, if you prefer). Here's how it works. In the preceding example, the implied question would be answered like this: He (she) had committed the murder in the ballroom with the lead pipe. Therefore, since a subjective case pronoun would be used to answer the implied question, we need who:
We finally discovered who had committed the murder in the ballroom with the lead pipe.
~~~~~~~~~~~
The item above is quoted exactly and in its entirety from a 2007 grammar text. It is without further context, before or after.
I think the word "committed" in the example sentence above is a past tense verb.
Is it not so?
.brad.24july08.
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