SOC 225 A01: Public Order Crimes and Proactive Luring Investigations

Vocabulary terms and definitions from the SOC 225 lecture on public order crimes, harm principles, and proactive luring investigative practices.

Public Order Crimes

Also known as victimless or consensual crimes, these are acts that are mala prohibitum, interfere with public order, or offend the moral sensibilities of some members of society.

Mala Prohibitum

Acts that are prohibited by law but are not necessarily inherently immoral; they often conflict with current public opinion, social policy, or moral sensibilities.

Vigilantes

Individuals who take the law into their own hands rather than relying on established legal authorities.

Moral Crusades

Social efforts aimed at ending behaviors that are considered morally objectionable, often targeting areas where the law is perceived to have failed or responded insufficiently.

Moral Entrepreneurs

Interest groups or individuals who attempt to control social life by promoting and enforcing a specific set of values or interests.

Harm (Locke's view)

The stance that reparation and restraint are the only two valid reasons why a state may rightfully harm an individual's life, liberty, health, or personal goods.

Harm Principle (Mill's view)

The philosophical position that interfering with an individual's autonomy constitutes a harm, and that people should be free to live as they choose provided they do not hurt others.

Welfare Interest

Essential requirements for a 'good life', including things like health, family, and mental acuity.

Focal Interests

Elements that make life worth living, such as an individual's specific goals and aspirations.

Legal Paternalism

The concept that the government or law should make decisions for individuals in their best interests, which John Stuart Mill generally opposed for capable adults.

Positive Rights

Rights that entitle a person to be subject to an action by another person or group, such as the right to counsel, housing, education, or police protection.

Negative Rights

Rights that ensure an individual is not subject to actions by others, including freedom of speech, private property, life, and freedom of religion.

Social Coercion (Social Sanction)

A formalized or legal punishment that is experienced by the individual rather than interacted with.

Non-coercive Influence

Influences that take the form of incentives or natural penalties and consequences, which can be rejected or debated by an individual.

Legal Good

A condition or interest useful to an individual (e.g., property, reputation) or the social system (e.g., public health).

Offense Principle

The idea that law should respond to behaviors that cause serious and unavoidable offense, though punishments should remain light.

Legal Moralism

A framework where laws restrict or force behavior based on a collective social judgment of morality; it is mostly rejected in Canada with exceptions like obscenity laws.

Proactive Luring Investigations

Police operations involving the creation of profiles of children/young people under the age of $14$, $16$, or $18$ to engage with individuals for the purpose of facilitating an offense.

R. v. Morrison ($2015$, $2019$)

A case involving a $67$-year-old man where the SCC ruled that the presumption of age section of the luring law was unconstitutional, despite his behavior being deemed inappropriate.

R. v. Gowdy ($2014$)

A case where a youth pastor was charged with luring and attempted aggravated sexual assault after police found paperwork indicating he was HIV positive.

R. v. Pengelley ($2009$)

A luring case involving a law professor and librarian targeted by an officer using the alias 'Stephania Cacciatore' in a BDSM chat room.

Project Raphael

A specific proactive luring investigation that targeted consensual sex work by having officers maintain $18+$ profiles on adult-only websites.

Entrapment (R v Mack)

Occurs when authorities provide an opportunity to commit an offense without reasonable suspicion/bona fide inquiry, or when they go beyond providing opportunity to induce the offense.

Bona Fide Inquiry

An investigation directed at a particular, precise location where there is a high likelihood of a specific criminal offense occurring.