The Mercantile Theory Of Criminal Law

However, due to this idea of strict liability offences not requiring proof of fault leads to the simple moral claim of ‘is it right to punish a person who had no intent to commit a crime, and took precautions not to let anyone get harmed in any way, to still be convicted?’ This opens the argument against the use of strict liability as it suggests that no matter what the opposing says, strict liability is a criminal offence and it is not vigorously enforced. This in turn lowers the respect to law and the criminal justice system as it appears that the justice system cannot

The basis of criminal justice in the United States is one founded on both the rights of the individual and the democratic order of the people. Evinced through the myriad forms whereby liberty and equity marry into the mores of society to form the ethos of a people. However, these two systems of justice are rife with conflicts too. With the challenges of determining prevailing worth in public order and individual rights coming down to the best service of justice for society. Bearing a perpetual eye to their manifestations by the truth of how "the trade-off between freedom and security, so often proposed so seductively, very often leads to the loss of both" (Hitchens, 2003, para. 5).

Crime is a serious issue in the United States. Research shows that crime is running rampant and its effects are felt in all socioeconomic levels. Each economic class has its own crime rates and types of crime. It is a mistake to think of crime as a lower class problem. Crime is a problem for all people. The lower classes commit crime for survival while the upper class commits crime to supplement capital and maintain control.

Humanity has no ultimate standards. There is no absolute wrong or right for the entirety, only differing perspectives adjusted by opinions and experiences. What inclines a person to enforce a law could be the same motive that encourages another to break it. This motivation born of commitment, passion, disregard, or indifference, is what blurs the line between criminality and lawful action. Although our notions of morality can be a societal norm or an individual bias, ultimately the perceived justness of ones cause motivates and governs ones actions. Fighting for a just cause is all in the eyes of the beholder. As is often said: One man 's freedom fighter is another 's terrorist.

The Business of Crime: Italians and Syndicate Crime in the United States, written by Humbert S. Nelli, contains the history of Italian criminal organizations in the New World, between 1880 and 1930. The book is divided into three main parts. The first chapter, From Italy's South to America's South, contains the political, social, economic, and cultural background of Italians before they entered in the New World. Also, it describes the beginning of criminal organizations, and the national wide impact created with the murder of Chief Hennesy (October 15, 1890). The second chapter, The Immigrant Era, describes the Italian involvement in syndicates activities, and discusses the widely publicized

1. Functionalist and conflict Perspectives are the two major theoretical perspectives we use in this class in relation to Crime and Criminal Justice. Functionalist perspective has various explanations for Criminal Behavior one of them being the idea of how Criminal Behavior separates acceptable from unacceptable behavior in the society. According to Durkheim, Laws are what makes people humans and he defined anomie as a state of normlessness, a structural condition where there is no or little regulation of behavior, which leads to irregular or criminal behavior. The perspective suggests that an increase in economy would initiate a decline in criminal activities. The other explanation was the idea of social control to criminal behavior. Society

There are many current criminal justice policies and laws that demonstrate how the policy has been informed by the theories that have been covered this semester. Many connections are not explicit but offer great detail in offering information based on the given topics. The current criminal justice policy that I’ve chosen was the sentencing policy. The sentencing policy was put together to reach every type of case that could possibly be seen in the criminal justice system. Here we will further discuss the sentencing policy, a case that I found to be a great example to understand the sentencing policy and how it can be overused, then we will move into how this policy have been informed by the rational choice theory, next we will cover its underlying assumptions and some of the ways it deviate, lastly we will discuss our alternative course of action which is the deterrence theory.

Dr. R.B. Brandt sheds light on the fact that the way society punishes humans in the modern criminal law system holds within itself shortcomings. The Yale graduate, argues that other forms of punishment, such as, required community service, probation, or even a reduction in the length of prison sentences benefit society more as a whole, thus appeasing the utilitarian mindset. R.B. Brandt’s target audience seems to be individuals interested in alternative forms of punishment in addition to people curious about utilitarian ideals within the scope of criminal law. This citation supports the idea that imprisonment is a flawed system and that criminals need to be exposed to some other form of punishment, especially rehabilitative methods, to pay

Therefore, it is plausible to conclude that Hart’s belief that “[l]aw without sanctions is perfectly conceivable” paints a more accurate portrayal of a modern legal system.

The authors confirm that there exists evidence supporting the fact that many criminal justice processes are unfair and could be described as biased, subjective, inequitable, serving financial morals and grows out of the criminal law. They also conclude from the study that the myth on the criminal justice system being fair is not true from the law making department down to the correctional department.

Source: Reprinted from The Limits of the Criminal Sanction by Herbert L. Packer, with the permission of the publishers, Stanford University Press. ( 1968 by Herbert L. Packer.

The history of punishments of criminal law is based on the English common law whose ideals where that crimes where based on an “immoral sin” and punishment is given in return for the moral wronging. However after the American Revolution, the mindset shifted and that a crime consisted on two key elements, a guilty deed and mindset. This ideology led to the development of four fundamentals of the American Law that we see today; deterrence, retribution, rehabilitation and incarceration. Whose main goals are to help make better citizens by condoning and punishing actions of wrong doing discourage people away from crimes and give specific punishments that detains the individual from not committing another crime such as, life with no parole.

Criminal law is an immense part in society, including the following functions: to deter a person from acts that harms them or society. Additionally, people who do not follow the rules that are being set by the authority, they will be punished. The criminal law is formed to guide the general public behaviour, which are seen acceptable by society. (Jonathan Herring criminal law eighth edition)

This paper is on the Classical School theory that emerged in the eighteenth century; two writes of this period were Cesare Beccaria and Jeremy Bentham. Among the major ideas that descend from this theory are the concepts of humans as free-willed, rational beings, utilitarianism (the greatest good for the greatest number), civil rights and due process of law, rules of evidence and testimony, determinate sentencing, and deterrence. The writes during this period examined not only human nature but also social conditions as well. The Classical School, gave us a humanistic conception of how law and criminal justice system should be constructed. Law was to protect the rights of both society and individual, and its chief purpose was to deter criminal behavior, the law emphasized moral responsibility and the duty of citizens to consider full the consequences of behavior before they acted. This thinking required humans possessing free will and a rations nature.

The actus rea involves offenses, and determined to obligate the action, or mens rea. Actus rea and mens rea ought to be established in order to find an individual guilty of obligating a crime. Strict liability offenses are transpired by the disadvantaged of the obligation of the mens rea. Strict liability is crimes in which the offender does not have a purpose to breach a strict liability law neither does they have the awareness of the lawful position of the exact strict liability offense. This paper will use two scholarly articles to discuss the critical analysis of expanding the concept of criminal behavior and law (strict liability).