Criminal Law
Saturday, April 11, 2009
3:30 PM
1. PURPOSES OF CRIMINAL PUNISHMENT
A. TEST CASE: Regina v. Dudley and Stephens
· Dudley and Stevens kill a boy they are shipwrecked with and eat him to survive
· Utilitarian view: net saving of lives makes it OK to kill
· Deontological: murder is immoral, it can’t be justified by cost/benefit analysis
B. DETERRENCE
· Goal of punishment should be to effectively deter criminal conduct
§ Specific Deterrence: deter the criminal himself
§ General Deterrence: deter other criminals
· Argument for: if punishment or value of pain is greater than benefit of act, act won’t be committed by a rational person
· Argument against: criminals aren’t rational, they don’t always calculate
§ But arguably they are rational at the most basic level; even animals can be deterred
· Why not use a tort system to deter?
§ Criminals are often insolvent
§ There are many victimless crimes
· Why not “over-deter”?
§ Deontological: over deterrence is wrong, unfair
§ Utilitarian: you get situations where robbers are more likely to murder their victims if it means not being caught, as the punishments for robbery/murder would be similar
· Utilitarian and Deterrence theorists think on similar grounds, both forward-looking
C. RETRIBUTION
· Goal of punishment should be to bring justice, right wrongs, etc.
· Argument for: Where deterrence is effectively served w/o directly punishing the criminal, we find this unfair, so this suggests we want a retributive aspect
· Argument against: punishing individual criminal doesn’t really benefit anyone
· Deontologists and Retributivism: disproportionate punishment isn’t allowed b/c excessive punishment is wrong and deterrence benefits don’t justify it
· Backwards-looking
D. MIXED THEORY
· Punishment should satisfy deterrence and retributive needs
· Deterrence/utilitarian determines what to punish, retrib. determines who and how much
E. REHABILITATION
· Goal of Punishment should be to rehabilitate criminals so they’re safe to return to the streets, or even turn them into functioning members of society
· Arguments Against:
§ Deterrence theorists are against this b/c there is no deterrence–maybe even reverse effects, esp. if the system is 100% effective
§ Retributivists don’t like this because there is no punishment at all, no just deserts
§ We’re allocating scarce resources to people that don’t deserve them
§ Paternalistic
§ We should be punishing not helping
F. INCAPACITATION
· Goal of punishment should be removing criminals from the streets, as doing so has proven to reduce crime rates
· Some studies suggest it costs twice as much to leave criminals on the street as it does to incarcerate them
· Economist rebuttal: incapacitation doesn’t lower crime, b/c if crime is there to be committed, someone will commit it; plus it’s hard to predict how many crimes these criminals would commit if they were released
2. PRINCIPAL LIABILITY
Requires an actus reus and mens rea
A. ACTUS REUS
To be convicted of a crime, D must’ve committed a criminal act.
A. Voluntary Act Requirement
§ MPC §2.01 Requirement of Voluntary Act
A person is not guilty of an offense unless his liability is based on conduct which includes a voluntary act or the omission to perform an act of which he is physically capable
The following are NOT voluntary acts:
A reflex or convulsion
A bodily movement during unconsciousness or sleep
Conduct during hypnosis or resulting from hypnotic suggestion
A bodily movement that otherwise is not a product of the effort or determination of the actor, either conscious or habitual
§ Voluntary/impending unconsciousness: if D causes or knows of impending unconsciousness, and voluntarily puts himself in the position where he might commit a crime, exceptions in (2) don’t apply
See Omissions
Possession is an act…if the possessor knowingly procured or received the thing possessed or was aware of his control thereof for a sufficient period to have been able to terminate his possession
§ Another view is that if A-B-C is the illegal act, then voluntary control over A, B, or C, is voluntary control over the entire combination (Martin- no control over being in public, but control over manifesting drunkenness)
§ Robinson v. California: SCOTUS case making it cruel and unusual punishment to criminalize a status; in this case, addiction
· Bu
ot relate exclusively to the statute of limitations, jurisdiction, venue, or to any other matter similarly unconnected w/ (1) the harm or evil, incident to conduct, sought to be prevented by the law defining the offense, or (2) the existence of a justification or excuse for such conduct…§1.13(10)
§ Joining §1.13(10) with §2.02(3), nonmaterial elements are treated as strict liability
· This includes jurisdictional elements
§ Attendant Circumstances: usually whatever mens rea the statute requires is required of the ACs, unless contrary legislative intent appears (e.g., “It is a felony to enter an occupied building with the purpose of stealing”)
Kinds of Culpability Defined.
1. Purposely
i. the element involves the nature of his conduct or a result thereof, it is his conscious object to engage in conduct of that nature or to cause such a result; and
ii. If the element involves attendant circumstances, he is aware of the existence of such circumstances or he believes or hopes that they exist.
2. Knowingly (Willfully):
i. the element involves the nature of his conduct or the attendant circumstances, he is aware that his conduct is of that nature or that such circumstances exist; and
ii. if the element involves a result of his conduct, he is aware that it is practically certain that his conduct will cause such a result.
§ We need purpose so intentionally firing a bullet at someone 1000 yards away and killing him is murder (although person didn’t know he would succeed)
§ Transferred Intent satisfies purpose/knowledge unless statute says otherwise
· The attempted harm and the harm caused must be similar
· D can be guilty of actual crime and of attempt to commit original crime
· MPC imposes liability in 2 circumstances (§2.03(2)):
