Criminal Law Lecture Flashcards

Flashcards covering key concepts from Criminal Law lectures, focusing on Actus Reus, Mens Rea, Causation, Homicide, and Rape.

Actus Reus

A volitional act that causes a social harm.

Volitional Act

Any bodily motion that is the product of effort or determination (conscious or habitual).

Non-Volitional Acts

Reflexes, convulsions, unconscious movements, sleepwalking, and conduct during hypnosis.

Time Framing

The legal fiction of looking at earlier behavior to determine criminal liability for a seemingly non-volitional act. The earlier volitional, morally blameworthy behavior renders the later act volitional.

Omission

A failure to act, which can be criminalized if there is a duty to act.

Duties to Act (Common Law)

Arise from special status relationships (spousal, parent-child, master-seaman), creation of harm, and voluntary assumption of care in a manner that prevents others from rendering aid.

Duties to Act (Statutory/Contractual)

Can be imposed by statute (e.g., reporting child abuse) or contract (e.g., babysitter's duty).

Possession (as an act)

Counts as an act if one knowingly procures or receives the item, or retains possession after becoming aware of control and having time to dispose of it.

Actual Possession

Physical control over an item.

Constructive Possession

Exercising dominion and control over the place where an item is located, or over the person who actually possesses the item.

Causation (Criminal Law)

Requires both actual cause (but-for) and proximate cause of the social harm.

But-For Cause

The social harm would not have occurred when it did and in the manner it did in the absence of, or but for, the defendant's conduct.

Proximate Cause

A limitation on but-for causation to ensure fairness in imposing criminal liability, especially when multiple actors contribute.

Intervening Cause

An independent force (another but-for cause) that operates in producing social harm after the defendant's voluntary act or omission.

Superseding Cause

An intervening cause that breaks the causal chain, relieving the initial defendant of criminal responsibility. Factors like de minimis contribution, foreseeability, and the defendant's mens rea are considered.

Year and a Day Rule

A common law rule in homicide cases stating that the defendant was not liable for homicide unless the victim died within a year and a day of the act that inflicted the injury (now largely discarded).

Social Harm

The negation, endangering, or destruction of an individual, group, or state interest deemed socially valuable; the denial of a socially valuable interest.

Result Crime

A crime where the prohibited social harm is a specific outcome, regardless of the conduct (e.g., murder is the killing of a human being).

Conduct Crime

A crime where the prohibited social harm is the act itself, regardless of the outcome (e.g., drunk driving is the act of driving while intoxicated).

Attendant Circumstances

Objective facts or conditions that must exist for a crime to be committed, accompanying the prohibited act or result (e.g., for burglary, it must be a 'dwelling' and 'at night').

Mens Rea

The defendant's mental state or culpability at the time of the crime; traditionally understood as a 'wicked mind' but evolved into elemental mental states.

Willfully (Mens Rea)

Requires proof that the actor not only acted intentionally, but also performed the prohibited act in bad faith, with a wrongful motive, or in violation of a known legal duty (intent plus).

Intentionally (Mens Rea - Common Law)

Includes both acting purposely or knowingly.

Purposely (Mens Rea)

When it is the defendant's conscious object to cause a result, engage in conduct, or be aware of, believe, or hope an attendant circumstance exists.

Knowingly (Mens Rea)

When the defendant is aware that it is practically certain their conduct will cause a result, or is aware their conduct is of a certain nature, or aware that attendant circumstances exist.

Motive

The 'why' behind an action, distinct from 'purpose' or 'intent' (the 'what'). Motive is generally not an element of a crime but can be relevant for specific intent crimes, litigation, and sentencing.

Transferred Intent (Switched Intent)

A doctrine used when a defendant intends to harm one person but accidentally harms another. The intent is 'switched' (not 'transferred') from the intended victim to the actual victim to avoid diminishing culpability unfairly.

Willful Blindness

A doctrine where knowledge of an attendant circumstance can be established if the actor believes there is a high probability that the circumstance exists and purposely avoids confirming it.

Concurrence of Elements

The requirement that Actus Reus and Mens Rea must occur at the same time (temporally) for criminal liability to be imposed.

General Intent Crime

Any crime committed with the mens rea of purposely or knowingly (intentionally), without an additional motive or awareness of attendant circumstances.

Specific Intent Crime

A general intent crime that requires an additional showing of a motive or an awareness of an attendant circumstance (intent plus), such as larceny (intent to permanently deprive).

Vicarious Liability

Imposes liability on a person due to their relationship with the person who committed the act, irrespective of the defendant's own actions or mens rea (generally not present in criminal law).

Strict Liability

Imposes liability based on Actus Reus alone, with the defendant's mens rea being irrelevant (rare in common law, but can be created by statute, especially for minor offenses/violations).

Recklessly (Mens Rea)

When a person consciously disregards a substantial and unjustifiable risk that a material element exists or will result from their conduct, involving a gross deviation from the conduct of a law-abiding person.

Negligently (Mens Rea)

When a person should be aware of a substantial and unjustifiable risk that a material element exists or will result from their conduct, involving a gross deviation from the standard of care of a reasonable person (equivalent to gross negligence in torts).

Malice/Maliciously (Mens Rea)

Historically a broad term meaning 'wickedness'; predominantly used in arson and homicide cases (e.g., 'malice aforethought' in murder).

Homicide

The death of a human being by another human being; an umbrella term encompassing murder, manslaughter, and other killings.

Murder (Common Law)

The unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought.

Manslaughter (Common Law)

The unlawful killing of a human being without malice aforethought.

First-Degree Murder (Pennsylvania Scheme)

Intentional killings committed with pre-meditation (quantity of time to reflect) and deliberation (quality of thought, calm state of mind).

Second-Degree Murder (Pennsylvania Scheme)

By default, all intentional killings not classified as first-degree murder (often unintentional killings with depraved heart, intent to cause serious bodily injury, or felony murder).

Heat of Passion Killing

An intentional killing downgraded from murder to manslaughter due to being committed under the influence of sudden, adequate provocation, before a reasonable opportunity to cool off.

Adequate Provocation (Common Law)

Limited to five circumstances: aggravated assault/battery, mutual combat, awareness of serious crime against a close relative, illegal arrest, and observation of spousal adultery.

Adequate Provocation (Modern Approach)

Whether victim's behavior would cause an ordinary person of fair, average disposition to act from passion rather than judgment (words alone generally not sufficient).

Extreme Mental or Emotional Disturbance (EMED)

Model Penal Code concept to mitigate murder to manslaughter; allows for gradual buildup of disturbed state, no requirement for victim's provocation, and broader range of emotions than 'heat of passion'.

Unlawful Killing

An attendant circumstance in homicide that exempts authorized and proper use of deadly force (e.g., by law enforcement) from criminalization.

Fleeing Felon Rule (Common Law)

Permitted law enforcement to use deadly force in arresting a fleeing felon, regardless of the felony type or danger posed by the felon (rejected by Tennessee v. Garner).

Human Being (Homicide)

A legal concept, traditionally defined as a born individual (not typically a fetus in common law), but may be expanded by statutes or judicial interpretation (e.g., brain death definition).

Brain Death

A modern medical/legal definition of death based on the irreversible cessation of all functions of the brain, including the brainstem, recognized by most states.

Feticide

A crime (often statutory, misdemeanor in common law) for killing a fetus, typically requiring the fetus to have 'quickened' (felt movement).

Rape (Common Law)

The carnal knowledge of a woman forcibly and against her will (non-consensual), with focus on penetration, force beyond mere penetration, and utmost resistance from the victim.

Carnal Knowledge

Penetration of the female sex organ by the male sex organ (common law definition of rape).

Utmost Resistance Rule

A demanding common law requirement for rape victims to show non-consent through continuous physical struggle reflecting full capacity, which eventually evolved to 'earnest' or 'reasonable' resistance.

Marital Immunity (Rape)

A controversial common law concept that conclusively presumed consent for sexual intercourse within a marriage, meaning no such thing as rape within a marriage (largely abolished).

Rape Shield Statutes

Evidentiary rules that limit the circumstances in which a defendant can introduce a victim's past sexual behavior in sexual assault cases.

Statutory Rape

A crime, arising from legislative enactment (originally in England), that criminalizes sex with a person below a certain age of consent, regardless of actual consent given the victim's legal incapacity to consent.

Affirmative Consent

The knowing, voluntary, and mutual decision among all participants to engage in sexual activity (e.g., in New York's 'Enough is Enough' legislation).

Sexual Contact (Broad Definition)

Intentional touching of genitalia, anus, groin, breast, inner thigh, or buttocks of any person (directly or through clothing) with intent to abuse, humiliate, harass, degrade, or arouse/gratify sexual desire.

Assault (Common Law)

An attempted battery OR the intentional creation of a reasonable apprehension in the victim's mind of imminent bodily harm; a specific intent misdemeanor.

Battery (Common Law)

The unlawful application of force to another resulting in bodily injury or offensive touching; a general intent misdemeanor.

Kidnapping (Common Law)

The unlawful confinement and transportation of another out of the country; a misdemeanor (later transformed into a serious felony).