Criminal Law Newsletter
Description
Criminal Law involves prosecution for an act that has been classified as a crime. Criminal Law is also known as Penal Law. Criminal Law refers to any of various bodies of rules in different jurisdictions whose common characteristic is the potential for unique and often severe impositions as punishment for failure to comply.
Penal Code
The Penal Code is a portion of the state’s laws defining crimes and specifying the punishment. The penal code is defined by the 50 states and the District of Columbia. The states and the District of Columbia shape the nature and scope of their jurisdiction. The jurisdiction decides the severity of the punishment.
Three Categories of Criminal Law
*Felonies
Felonies involve the most serious of crimes.
*Misdemeanors
Misdemeanors are gross, ordinary or petty crimes.
*Infractions
Infractions are crimes including; petty offenses, or a violation of an administrative regulation, ordinance or municipal code.
Types of Crime included in Criminal Law
*Crimes against Property
Property Damage
Property damage is the destruction of private or public property caused by an individual who is not its owner. The damage may occur by either neglect (including oversight and human error) or intentional damage.
Arson
Arson is the crime of maliciously, voluntarily, and willfully setting fire to the building, buildings or property of another. Arson can also include setting fire to ones own property for reasons of profit.
Theft
Theft is also known as stealing. Theft is the illegal taking of another’s property. Theft encompasses different categories of the seriousness of crimes including; embezzlement, larceny, looting, robbery, mugging, trespassing, shoplifting, intrusion, fraud, and sometimes criminal conversion (permitting unauthorized use of someone else’s property).
Burglary
Burglary is also called breaking and entering and sometimes house breaking. Burglary involves trespassing and theft. Burglary is the unlawful act of entering another’s property, such as a house or automobile with the intent of theft or another crime such as vandalism.
Deception
Deception is an act by an individual used to obtain property by misleading or persuading under false presumptions. Deceptions can relate to actual or supposed facts, or to an existing state of affairs. An example of deception is selling counterfeited goods as genuine items.
*Crimes Against People
Assault
Assault is a crime of violence against another person. In the United States assault may also refer to the threat of violence caused by an immediate show force. In some jurisdictions the intent to cause bodily harm is ruled as assault while the actual act of causing bodily harm is ruled as battery. Assault can also be any physical contact with another person without their consent.
Battery
The common law rules simple battery as a misdemeanor. Simple battery involves an unlawful application of force to the person of another resulting in either bodily injury or an offensive touching.
The common law elements are used as a guide, however each state and individual jurisdiction determine how battery is broken down into graduations and the severity of punishment.
Simple Battery:
Simple battery may include any form of contact not permitted by the individual whether or mot an injury is caused.
Criminal Battery:
Criminal Battery requires intent to inflict an injury on another.
Sexual Battery:
Sexual battery may be defined as non-consensual touching of the intimate parts of another.
Family Violence Battery:
Family violence battery is limited to the unit of those closely related or in a house hold. This offense has had greater exposure due to the increasing awareness of Domestic Violence.
Aggravated Battery:
Aggravated battery or as sometimes subsumed in the definition of aggravated assault is the most serious offense and is of felony grade. Aggravated battery involves the loss of the victim’s limb or some other type of permanent disfigurement of the victim.
In general, the difference between assault and battery is determined by the amount of actual contact with the victim. An assault usually involves the subject attempting to strike or pursue the victim. The act of battery occurs when the subject actually strikes the victim.
Robbery
Robbery is the crime of taking property from another person with no intention of returning it by means of force or fear. Robbery involves the act of seizing property through intimidation or fear. The precise definition of robbery varies between jurisdictions.
Sexual Offenses
Sexual Offenses are often called Sex Crimes. Sex Crimes are forms of human sexual behavior that are crimes. Sex Crimes are considered such when human sexual behavior also involves an act of violence or any other socially prohibited conduct. Examples of socially prohibited conduct include; incest, sodomy (abnormal intercourse), sexual violation, indecent exposure, and exhibitionism. Sexual activity involving children below the legal age of consent, illegal watching or non-consensual displays of sexual advancement, sex with close relatives (incest), harm to animals, and sexual acts involving the deceased (necrophilia), are all sexual offenses. Any act inducing harassment, nuisance, fear, injury or assault of a sexual nature or serious risk of abuse of certain professional relationships can be deemed a sexual offense in the court of law.
Pimping:
Pimping is a form of sex crime. Pimping involves the illegal control of a business relating to prostitution. A pimp finds and manages clients for prostitutes in order to profit from their earnings.
Rape:
Rape is a sex crime which is a form of sexual assault. Rape is an assault which involves sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration against the consent of the victim.
Kidnapping
Kidnapping is a common law offense requiring:
That one person takes and carries another away; by force or fraud; without the consent of the person taken; and without lawful excuse.
Kidnapping in just, is the act of one person holding another person in confinement without the legal authority to do so.
Manslaughter
Man slaughter is broken down into two distinct categories known as Voluntary Manslaughter and Involuntary Manslaughter. The difference between manslaughter and murder is determined by the mental state of the criminal involved.
Voluntary Manslaughter:
Voluntary manslaughter describes cases where the defendant may have intent to kill or cause bodily harm due to certain circumstances which have altered his or her mental state and judgment. The most common example of Voluntary Manslaughter is a crime of passion killing. An ordinarily level minded person becomes temporarily murderous due to a drastic situation.
Involuntary Manslaughter:
An Involuntary Manslaughter charge is the result of the defendant having no intent to kill or cause harm, but due to extreme negligence or recklessness, serious injury or death occurred.
Murder
Murder is the act of killing someone with intentional and premeditated purpose. To be charged with murder the killing must result from the defendant having reckless indifference or no regard for human life.
Crimes Against Justice
Obstruction of Justice
The crime of Obstruction of Justice applies to elected officials who try to conceal evidence and interfere in any sort of police work or investigation. Obstruction charges are filed when it is discovered that a person questioned in an investigation, which is not a suspect, has lied to investigating officers. Obstruction of Justice charges can also apply to a person who alters or destroys physical evidence.
Bribery
Bribery is the act of using money or gifts to persuade or change a person’s actions or thoughts. The crime of bribery is defined by “Black’s Law Dictionary” as the offering, giving, receiving, or soliciting of any item of value to influence the actions of an official or other person in discharge of a public or legal duty.
Bribery exists in many forms and in many professions. Acts of bribery are most common in medicine, politics, business, and sports.
Perjury
Perjury is also known as foreswearing. Perjury is the act of lying and or knowingly producing false statements or evidence on a material matter while under oath or affirmation in a court of law. To be convicted of perjury, the false information must be relevant to the outcome of the case. An affirmation exists when the witness chooses to not swear to tell the truth due to not having any religious beliefs. In this case the witness will agree to affirm that they are telling the truth, which produces the affirmation.
Malfeasance in Office
While there is no exact definition of Malfeasance in Office, it is an Act of Official Misconduct. Malfeasance is the doing of an act by an official which the official compromised the morality of his or her position. In most cases the official performing the misconduct used their position to attain something wrongful and unlawful. Malfeasance in Office is often grounds for a for cause removal of an elected official by statute or recall election. The act of malfeasance can involve the misuse of authority or the use of power by an official to obtain personal benefits unlawfully.
Criminal Law Background
Criminal Law generally prohibits undesirable acts.
The origins of criminal law came from English Law. Sir Edward Coke (pronounced “Cook”) developed in English Law the principles criminal law is based on. Edward Coke stated the Latin phrase “Actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea” which means; “An act does not make a person guilty unless (their) mind is also guilty.” This notion can be broken down into two basic elements also of Latin origin:
actus reus; The objective element of a crime. “Guilty act”
mens rea; Proof of the intent to do a bad thing. “Guilty mind”
Both elements must be present at exactly the same time.
In essence, the basis of criminal law revolves around the ideal that proof of a crime requires proof of some act.
This website is intended for educational purposes only. It is not legal advice, nor does it form a lawyer/client relationship. For legal advice, you should contact a licensed attorney to discuss your particular situation.
