Since before the creation of common law, people from every society have broken the moral guidelines that existed. Even Though the majority of these communities willing fought to stop the few individuals that went against the social norms, many of the actions still occurred. Since before the creation of common law, the people within these societies have struggled to find the exact way they would want the offenders to be punished. Within this time frame, the people have also changed the parameters that make all crimes what they are today. For the third core essay, the class was asked to write about one of the crimes against property. The offenses that were developed during the creation of the common law that fit as a crime against property include: …show more content…
One part of the common law that makes it stand out from the modern statutes of today, is how an offender's guilt is decided. The terms actus reus and mens rea are both used to determine if the person should be punished for the act they have committed. Within the common law, both of these terms have to be successfully proven for an individual to be punished. According to the common laws, these terms are considered the physical and mental elements to all crimes (Samaha, 2015, p. 97). Actus reus is defined as the wrongful act within the crime that was committed, while mens rea is considered to be the wrongful mental state of the individual during the commission of the crime (Samaha, 2015, p. 97). These two terms have been applied within common law to theft. The actus reus of theft is the commission of the crime itself. The commission of a theft includes the actions of, “intentionally getting control of someone else’s property” (Samaha, 2015, p. 435). The mens rea of theft includes two things, the original intention to deprive the owner of the item and being dishonest when acquiring it (Theft|free). Even Though the common law regarding theft has not stopped the crime, it has been successful in determining the guilt of the …show more content…
Throughout the history of what is now part of most state statutes, theft laws have made significant progressions. The beginning of the modern idea of theft began long ago with the growing concerns of the violent crimes against persons (Samaha, 2015, p. 433). These concerns the people of the time shared, lead to the creation of the felony robbery, within common law (Samaha, 2015, p. 433). The idea behind robbery was, “taking property by force or the threat of force” (Samaha, 2015, p. 433). The creation of this law within the idea of crimes against persons lead to the next big jump towards the criminal action of theft. For the most part, the law of robbery did cover the acts that happened violently, but did not cover any of the acts that happened without violence. What the people of that time needed was a law that guarded them from individuals taking their possession away from them unknowingly. The Anglo-Saxons created the idea of larceny. When larceny made, the people of the time would be protected from both robbery and the early ideas regarding theft. Larceny is defined as, “taking and carrying away a person’s property without force”(Samaha, 2015, p. 433). The common law of larceny was developed to protect the Anglo-Saxons from other people taking their livestock (Samaha, 2015, p. 433). Although this new law guarded one the most important possessions of this time, it did not protect them from
Men rea is used in determining whether an act is considered a crime, and is applied to an act if there is indication that the act was committed with intent or knowledge or a degree of recklessness. The mens era of murder is having malice intentions prior to killing someone, so the person has an intent to murder. The argument that helps support that Martineau did not have the mens rea for murder, is the fact that he did not shoot the couple, and instead it was his friend Tremblay who had fried the pellet pistol. Martineau cannot be held accountable since he had no malice intentions to kill the couple, his intentions were strictly centred with the break and enter, there is no evidence
Was there ever a time when people did not break the law? The Elizabethan Era was one of the most known periods of English history. Being known for its great success in change and discovery, it was also remembered for its violent and brutal times. A subject that many people were interested in from this era was the crime and punishment. As people looked back the crime and punishment of the era, there were three factors that stood out from the construction of its history. They were: the crimes that were committed, the people who committed them, and the punishments they received. From much research on Elizabethan crime, punishment, and people, researchers discovered that the crime and punishment during the era certainly was not ordinary and sometimes
Theft, the act of stealing, larceny, was a common law offence, but there were a large number of statutes which legislated specific punishments for particular types of theft. Of the 16,424 cases of theft between 1714 and 1799 sixty six percent were simple grand larcenies, the most common type. Simple grand larceny was defined as "the theft of goods of the value of 1 shilling (12 pence = 1 Shilling.
Martynenko, Natalia, and Eduard Martynenko. "Advantages and Disadvantages of Confiscating Property as a Criminal Law Measure." Internal Security 3.1 (2011): 225-30. Criminal Justice Abstracts with Full Text. EBSCO. Web. 15 June 2015.
From the beginning of time mankind have committed crime. Medieval Europe was rife with crime and the punishments were harsh. Throughout the Medieval period attitudes to crime and punishment changed. From 500AD-1500AD in Europe the way punishments were decided and carried out had developed from a sense of fear and crowd pleasing into a structured legal system.
The “mens rea” of first degree murder is that the person, with time and intent, planned out or premeditated the murder. The “actus reas” of first degree murder is the actual act of committing the murder after planning it (Lippman, 2006).
The term ‘Actus Reus’ is Latin, and translates to ‘the guilty act’ , it refers to the thing that the offender did that wa...
According to Foucault, the penal justice system in the eighteenth century followed one fundamental principle: there should be no punishment without an explicit law and an explicit behavior violating the law (Foucault, “Truth and Juridical Forms” 56). Th...
Actus reus refers to a criminal act that occurs or happens as a result of voluntary bodily movement (Dressler, 2015). In other words, it is a physical activity that harms an individual, or damage properties. Every physical activity such as murder to the destruction of public properties qualifies to be an actus reus. It consists of all the elements of a crime other than the state of mind of the offender. Apparently, it may consist of conduct, the state of affairs, result, or an omission.
To be criminally liable of any crime in the UK, a jury has to prove beyond reasonable doubt, that the defendant committed the Actus Reus and the Mens Rea. The Actus Reus is the physical element of the crime; it is Latin for ‘guilty act’. The defendant’s act must be voluntary, for criminal liability to be proven. The Mens Rea is Latin for guilty mind; it is the most difficult to prove of the two. To be pronounced guilty of a crime, the Mens Rea requires that the defendant planned, his or her actions before enacting them. There are two types of Mens Rea; direct intention and oblique intention. Direct intention ‘corresponds with everyday definition of intention, and applies where the accused actually wants the result that occurs, and sets out to achieve it’ (Elliot & Quinn, 2010: 59). Oblique intention is when the ‘accused did not desire a particular result but in acting he or she did realise that it might occur’ (Elliot & Quinn, 2010: 60). I will illustrate, by using relevant case law, the difference between direct intention and oblique intention.
Murder: The offence of murder is an example of unlawful homicide; it is defined by Sir Coke as the "unlawful killing of a reasonable person in being, who is under the [Queen's] peace, with malice aforethought, express or implied." The actus reus of murder is the "unlawful killing of a reasonable person in being, who in under the monarch's peace". To break it down: An unlawful killing is, quite simply, a person causing that is not allowed in law.
Attempted murder, involved the voluntary act of Jack pointing a gun and firing it (act) at Bert that resulted in (causation) death of Pratt (social harm), which proves the elements of actus reus. ...
Crimes are not ‘given’ or ‘natural’ categories to which societies simply respond. The composition of such categories change from various places and times, and is the output of social norms and conventions. Also, crime is not the prohibitions made for the purpose of rational social defence. Instead, Durkheim argues that crimes are those acts which seriously violate a society’s conscience collective. They are essentially violations of the fundamental moral code which society holds sacred, and they provoke punishment for this reason. It is because of these criminal acts which violate the sacred norms of the conscience collective, that they produce a punitive reaction. (Ibid)
Punishing the unlawful, undesirable and deviant members of society is an aspect of criminal justice that has experienced a variety of transformations throughout history. Although the concept of retribution has remained a constant (the idea that the law breaker must somehow pay his/her debt to society), the methods used to enforce and achieve that retribution has changed a great deal. The growth and development of society, along with an underlying, perpetual fear of crime, are heavily linked to the use of vastly different forms of punishment that have ranged from public executions, forced labor, penal welfare and popular punitivism over the course of only a few hundred years. Crime constructs us as a society whilst society, simultaneously determines what is criminal. Since society is always changing, how we see crime and criminal behavior is changing, thus the way in which we punish those criminal behaviors changes.
A defence in criminal law arises when conditions exist to negate specific elements of the crime: the actus reus when actions are involuntary, the mens rea when the defendant is unaware of the significance of their conduct, or both. These defences will mitigate or eliminate liability from a criminal offence. Insanity, automatism and diminished responsibility are examples of said defences. They each share characteristics but can be distinguished in their scope and application.