CRJ 370: Chapter 2

Principle of legality

Means that no one can be convicted of, or punished form a crime unless the law defined the crime and prescribed the punishment before the person engaged in the behavior that was defined as a crime.

Three constitutional principles fall under the principle of legality

1. Ex post facto laws

2. Due process void-for-vagueness doctrine

3. Rule of lenity

What are Ex post facto laws

Retroactive criminal lawmaking. Must do three things

1. Criminalizes an act that wasn’t a crime when it was committed

2. Increases the punishment for a crime after the crime was committed (not a reduction in punishment, only an increase)

3. Takes away a defense that was available to the defendant at the time the crime was committed

What are the two major purposes of ban ex post facto laws

To protect individuals by ensuring that legislature give them fair warning to what is criminal and prevent legislators from passing arbitrary and vindictive laws

What are Void-for-Vagueness Doctrine

The principle that statutes violate due process if they don’t define a crime and its punishment clearly enough for ordinary people to know what is lawful. A law is so vague if it forbids conduct and prescribes punishment in terms so uncertain that ordinary people must guess before acting. Fails to give warning

Vague laws violate due process of law

Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. constitution ban both federal and state governments from taking any person’s “life, liberty, or property without due process of law”

What is rule of Lenity

requires courts to resolve every ambiguity in a criminal statute in favor of the defendant. In practice SCOTUS only applies to cases involving core felonies known as “narrow rule of lenity”.

What are the condition in every criminal case to prove guilt

Presumption of innocence and Burden of proof

Presumption of Innocence

Defendant is presumed innocent unless and until the government proves otherwise

Burden of Proof

Government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt “every fact necessary to constitute the crime charged”. Defendants have not legal responsibility to cooperate or prove their innocence in criminal case.

Affirmative defenses

Requires defendants to put in some evidence in support of their defenses of justification and excuse (burden of production)

First Amendment

Right to Free Speech “Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech”

Second Amendments

Right to Bear Arms, the right of law-abiding responsible citizens to use arms in defense of hearth and home

Constitutional Right to Privacy

Bans all governmental invasion of the sanctity of a man; home and the privacies of life

Void for overbreadth doctrine

Protects speech guaranteed by the first amendment by invaliding laws written so broadly that the fear of prosecution creates “a chilling effect” that discourages people from exercising that freedom

Fundamental right to privacy

A right that requires the government to prove that a completing interest justifies invading one’s privacy