Chapter 3 Flashcards
Actus rea
The act or omission that compromise the physical elements of a crime as required by statue.
Beyond reasonable doubt
The prosecution must convince the jury that there is no reasonable explanation that can come from the evidence presented at trial.
Case law
The use of court decisions to determine how other law should apply in a given situation.
Criminal law
The laws, procedures, institutions, and policies at play before, during,and after the commission of a crime.
Incapacitation
Reduces crime by preventing someone from committing crime in a society through direct control during the incarceration experience.
Retribution
The belief that an offender deserves to receive suffering that matches the severity of the crime committed.
Specific deterrence
The effect of legal punishment on those individuals who actually undergo the punishment.
Restitution
Full or partial compensation for loss paid by a criminal to a victim that is ordered as part of a criminal sentence or as a condition of probation.
Stare decisis
holds that courts and judges should honor “precedent”—or the decisions, rulings, and opinions from prior cases.
Mens rea ( guilty mind )
The intent to commit a crime.
by a preponderance of the evidence
to prove that something is more likely than not.
Common law
a body of unwritten laws based on legal precedents established by the courts.
Civil law
is a branch of law that regulates the non-criminal rights, duties of persons (natural persons and legal persons) and equal legal relations between private individuals, as opposed to criminal law or administrative law.
Rehabilitación
focuses on helping the offender understand their wrongs and prepares them to re-enter society as a reformed person.
Detterence
the theory that criminal penalties do not just punish violators, but also discourage other people from committing similar offenses.
