Causation

Question 1

What is criminal causation?

Answer 1

Actual causation (but for) + Legal Causation = Criminal causation
it only matters in “result” crimes
The concept of “personal responsibility for crimes”

Question 2

What do legal causation test?

Answer 2

Looks at the D and asks “what did he or should he have reasonably foreseen?”
OR
Looks at the actual causes of the victim’s death and asks how unrelated to the defendant’s acts were those independent occurrences?

Question 3

What is the basic approach to causation?

Answer 3

1. “But for”
2. Dependent or Independent intervening cause?
   dependent: if it was foreseeable (objective) and reasonably related to the defendant’s conduct
   independent: if it was NOT foreseeable (objective) and not reasonably related to defendant’s conduct

Question 4

MPC §2.03 Causation for Purpose or Knowledge

Answer 4

1st: “but for” test.

If crime requires purpose or knowledge and a
particular result, the “element is not established if
the actual result is not within the purpose or the
contemplation of the actor.”
But, causation can be satisfied if “the actual result
involves the same kind of injury or harm as that
designed or contemplated and is not too remote or
accidental in its occurrence ….”

Question 5

MPC §2.03 Causation for Recklessly or Negligently

Answer 5

The actual result should be within the risk
that the actor is aware of or, under
negligence, that he should have been
aware of.
Causation is satisfied if the “actual result
differs from the probable result only in the
respect that a different person or different
property is injured…”
Causal chain not broken “if the actual result
involves the same kind of injury or harm as
the probable result and is not too remote or
accidental . . .”