Criminal Law Course Outline
Fall 2006—Professor Aarons
3) Modern Role of Criminal Statutes
a) Origin of Common Law
i) Principle of Legality
(1) No crime w/o Pre-Existing Law; No Punishment w/o Pre-Existing Law
(2) Forbids Judicial Crime Creation
(3) Penal Laws must be strictly construed in favor of the defendant
ii) MPC 1.02 (3)
(1) MPC shall be construed based on Fair Import of Terms and Interpreted to favor purpose of MPC.
iii) MPC 1.05 (1)
(1) Reiterates Legality Principle à No conduct is an offense unless a crime or violation under this code or statute.
iv) Keelor v. Superior Court
(1) Case of whether fetus is considered a human being under murder statute
(2) Legislature used C/L of “born alive” to interpret statute
(3) Rule of Lenity à Law is construed in favor of the accused when there is ambiguity in interpretation (Strict Construction)
(4) Fair Warning of Laws is well settled and guaranteed under Due Process Clause. Laws cannot be enlarged by judicial decree, but must be done by legislative measures to give fair warning. Prevents Ex Post Facto Laws
(5) Charge of murder not sustained since Due Process would be violated w/ a charge that gave no fair warning to the accused of his crime.
v) Statutory Clarity
(1) In re Banks
(a) Case discusses clarity of “Peeping Tom” statute and whether it is unconstitutional for lack of definiteness and ambiguity.
(b) Criminal Statutes must be construed strictly w/ regard to the evil the statute was meant to remedy.
(c) Boyce states that statutes should be sufficiently definite to give them notice of conduct & to guide judge/jury/lawyers in its application
(d) Statute derived from C/L meaning and applied C/L meaning
(e) Statute seen as definite to guide proper application and not overly broad based on prior interpretation of purpose (Lemon)
(f) Lenity Construction cannot be applied to a statute if its unconstitutional
vi) Problems of Statutory Interpretation
(1) Statutory Interpretations/Canons of Construction
(a) Plain-Meaning of text unless obvious flaws in language
(b) Strict Construction on C/L meaning vs. Fair Import of Terms
(c) Implied Exceptions to the rule
(d) Legislative History of Statute, Title of Statute and Caption of Ac
nder Actus Reus.
(3) Criminal Responsibility must be judged at the level of a person’s consciousness (Sikora) à Judging consciousness regarding controlling their action.
(4) Acts are willed movement or omissions of legally required performance
(5) If person voluntarily induces state of unconsciousness, then actions are seen as having culpability under Actus Reus.
v) Reconcile Decina, Utter and Martin
(1) Martin: No voluntary act; Conviction overturned since act seen as involuntary.
(2) Utter: Voluntary Act; Focused on act and its result; Defense of conditional response making act involuntary overruled since unconsciousness state was self-induced.
Decina: Voluntary Act seen in driver operating car when known epileptic state was present. Defense that seizure caused him to hit and kill children overruled since driver knew of condition prior to operating car. (Not Pros. Under MPC 2.01 (1) (2).
