Criminal Law Outline

CRIMINAL LAW OUTLINE

SWARTZ

SPRING 2014

Theories of punishment

Retributive: just desserts; you are punished for what you did (specific deterrence)

Utilitarian: benefit to society; punishment for punishment sake; punishing you to make me feel better (general deterrence)

Purpose of the Criminal Law

· Specific Deterrence: punishing an individual who has broken the law to specifically deter him or her from breaking the law in the future.

· General Deterrence: punishing an individual who has broken the law as an example to generally deter other members of society from engaging in similar behavior.

· Incapacitation: (restraint) physically or otherwise preventing individuals from perpetrating future crimes (ex. prison, death penalty)

· Retribution: giving an individual who has broken the law his or her “just desserts,” in part because morally this is the right thing to do, and in part to channel the human instinct for revenge through the criminal justice process so as to limit vigilantism.

· Rehabilitation: changing the behavior of those who have broken the law so that they will not commit more crimes when they are released.

Corpus Delicti

4 Elements of a Criminal Offense

Mens Rea

Crime committed: Death criminal agency (person who dies as a result of criminal agency)

Defendant who committed the crime

Cannot establish a crime was committed based on defendants statement alone

· If you cannot prove a cause of death how do you prove a homicide

Actus reus: (guilty act) a physical act (or unlawful omission) by defendant.

Mens rea: (guilty mind) the state of mind or intent of the defendant at the time of his act.

Concurrence: in order for there to be a crime there must be a concurrence

Causation

o Legal cause/cause in fact (“but for”)

o Proximate cause (legal cause)

Mala in se: wrong in itself (ex. rape) acts morally wrong; offenses against conscience; inherently evil

Mala prohibita: (strict liability) – made criminal by statute (ex. parking in the red) liable whether or not you intended to do it ex. drunk driving) – conduct that is prohibited by law

moral stigma: make you go to court because you got a parking ticket’

· You must first establish a crime was commited and then move onto whom

· To establish corpus delecti it is not necessary for the body to be found

Causation: general rule – defendant is liable for all natural and probable consequences of his conduct unless the chain of causation is broken by the intervention of some superseding factor.

HOMICIDE

COMMON LAW MODEL PENAL CODE

1. Murder: unlawful killing with malice aforethought

1. Murder

Malice Aforethought (mens rea)

1. Intent to Kill (Specific Intent – not only intended to do crime but intended consequences)

2. Intent to do Great Bodily Harm (Specific Intent)

3. Depraved Heart (General Intent – ex. shoot at train)

a. Conscious (knowingly endangered human life)

b. Very High Risk (reckless and extreme indifference)

c. Without Justification, Provocation or Excuse

4. Felony Murder: common law everything was a felony

· Discuss death during commission of inherently dangerous felony

· Enumerated felonies (other than drug trafficking) are violent crimes against people

Purposefully: 1st Degree Murder

1. Willful

2. Premeditated: ? of reflection

3. Deliberate

· Subject to a 2nd thought

· Easy way to know is if they slept on it

Knowingly: 2nd Degree Murder

1. Willful

2. Premeditated