Intro to Criminal Law Flashcards
mala in se
crimes that involve conduct that is ‘wrong in intself’
mala prohibita
crimes where the conduct is not seen as ‘intrinsically wrong’ but still needs to be prohibited
example of mala in se and mala prohibita combined
R v Barnfather 2008
school attendance case
how does Fitzjames Stephen describe the common law system (1883)?
‘system of compulsion’
‘collection of threats of injury … to liberty and property if people are to commit crimes’
what are the purposes of punishment?
punish deter reform protect the public reparations
what is the purpose of the presumption of innocence?
to ensure that individuals are only convicted if they are found, beyond reasonable doubt, to be guilty which justifies the intense punishment of imprisonment
Blackstone - ‘better that 10 guilty people escape than that 1 innocent person is punished’
how does Ho Hock Lai describe the effector convicting the innocent?
‘form of political injustice where one is publicly condemned by the state’
what is the ‘evidential test’?
the requirement to prove beyond reasonable doubt
how does Horder describe the perception of crime can be warped by?
in what book?
that the crimes that get trials depend upon whether they’re reported on by the police
Ashworth’s Principles of Criminal Law
what is the concept of ‘crime management’?
prosecution deciding to pursue D for a lesser crime in order for an increased likelihood of conviction
ex// manslaughter rather than that of a murder accusation
what does Jareborg argue that punishment expresses?
not just ‘a threat of a painful sanction’
but ‘an official expression of how negatively different kinds of actions/ omissions are judged’
what is cardinal proportionality?
severity of the punishment to be in line with the severity of the offence
