What is the relevant age for a crime? When it is committed, when one is charged of it, or when one is sentenced for it? Bob committed a crime when he was young. After successfully getting away, many years later, it comes out (with good evidence) that he committed the crime, and so he is charged for it. Lastly, after many years in court (due to any number of complicating factors), Bob is finally successfully convicted. My question is, when sentencing Bob, which age is the most relevant? The age when he committed the crime, the age when he was charged, or the age when he was convicted in court? Just two examples: Bob committed murder at age 12, was caught and convicted at age 25 Bob committed murder at age 14, was charged at age 16, and only successfully convicted at age 19 Feel free to swap out the crime/ages with what you think is most relevant. Edit: Of particular note for consideration: isn't the fact that Bob, as an adult, hides a murder, worthy of being charged for any crime whatsoever?
england-and-wales It's the date, and therefore Bob's age, when the offence was committed The basic position when an offender is sentenced is that it should be according to the law at the time the offence was committed, not the law at the time when they are sentenced. This has been reinforced by Article 7 of the European Convention of Human Rights. It is a general legal principle that the law should not be applied retrospectively – so that people are able to know the penalty for an offence. Source
This occurred in Hong Kong, so Hong Kong law applies here. Hong Kong law's definition of rape is explicitly male on female (nonconsensual male-male is covered by sodomy laws instead). It is impossible for her to be charged with rape. Assuming you were over 16 at the time, the only offence that could be possible is indecent assault. As far as I can tell, there is no statute of limitations. However, the chance of her being charged is basically zero.
The law was first promulgated on June 8, 1940 By the 76th Congress. The original text is here. It doesn’t seem to be a particularly important piece of legislation and I can find commentary on it and I’m not going to read the debates - if you do, please get back to us. Two points to note, it was passed at a time when most of the rest of the world was at war and the US was quietly preparing to be at war and it seems to be intended to fill a gap in state law since conviction under state law is a defence under Federal.
In the US, only crimes that involve death or crimes against the state can be punished with death, see Kennedy v. Louisiana, 554 U.S. 407 (this was a child rape case and execution was held to be unconstitutional). There is a consideration of "proportionality" whereby execution is not an option for all crimes involving death. The court doesn't include or exclude non-death cases, they explicitly kick the can down the road ("We do not address, for example, crimes defining and punishing treason, espionage, terrorism, and drug kingpin activity, which are offenses against the State"). Therefore, there is no ruling that bars execution for treason, but there is for rape and burning someone's stack of hundreds. This is a list of 2008 pre-Kennedy non-murder "surviving" state capital offenses (most of the cases listed in the article are for rape, which was ruled unconstitutional): Treason (Arkansas, Calif., Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Washington) Aggravated kidnapping (Co., Idaho, Il., Missouri, Mont.) Drug trafficking (Fl., Missouri) Aircraft hijacking (Ga., Mo.) Placing a bomb near a bus terminal (Mo.) Espionage (New Mexico) Aggravated assault by incarcerated, persistent felons, or murderers (Mont.) However, in Washington the death penalty is now unconstititional. The Missouri penalty for treason has been since reduced to a maximum of life imprisonment. On the other hand, Florida still has a "capital drug trafficking" penalty if you import 300+ kg of cocaine, knowing that "the probable result of such importation would be the death of any person" (death does not have to actually result). Here is a list of federal crimes that allow execution, which includes only large-scale drug trafficking, espionage and treason in the non-death crimes.
This is actually a very complicated question, about (1) the scope of "knowingly", (2) what kind of "intent" is required for conviction, (3) how does the jury understand and evaluate concepts of intent and (4) how does an attorney persuade the jury that the situation does or does not satisfy the particular intent requirement. One thing we can dispose of quickly is the possibility that the law says that the accused has to actually know that the act is against the law. It is a standard legal fiction (2,400 years old) that the accused knows the law, or should have known. As for the 4th element, persuasion, on the strong side we have statements of intent by the accused – "And I pulled out my rifle and blew his head off, and I laughed the whole time". What the jury has to decide is whether the accused had in mind a conscious purpose of doing some act (that is, it wasn't just an accident like butt-dialing, or an instant stimulus-response reaction to some event). "Intent" generally falls in the realm of acting "purposely", which the Model Penal Code §2.02 defines as: A person acts purposely with respect to a material element of an offense when: (i) if the element involves the nature of his conduct or a result thereof, it is his conscious object to engage in conduct of that nature or to cause such a result; and (ii) if the element involves the attendant circumstances, he is aware of the existence of such circumstances or he believes or hopes that they exist. which more or less means what you think "with intent" means. That doesn't say what they intended to do, it just distinguishes intent from negligence and accident. The prosecutor would then present factual evidence that the accused had a bad intent, like showing that he actually made an attempt to access credit card account data (that such data had been accessed when he broke into the system), etc. We can sort of dispose of the other scope question about "knowingly", namely, what things would he have to know? The chunk accessing a protected computer without authorization can be interpreted in a number of ways, having to do with which elements of the clause are known to the accused. You might know that you were accessing but not know that you were unauthorized; you might know that you were accessing and unauthorized, but not know that the computer is protected. The only reliable way to know which is which is to study the case law on a statute and see if there is a controlling decision that say e.g. that you have to know that you are accessing and are unauthorized, but you don't have to know that the computer is protected. I haven't determined (yet) is there is decisive case law on this, but I'm betting that the outcome would be that not knowing of the protected status of a computer carries no weight. As for what kind of intent, there is a distinction between "specific intent" and "general intent". The distinction comes down to having some evil purpose like "make him suffer" (general intent) versus a specific evil purpose like "kill him". Finally, the people who actually decide, the jury, will be given instructions that say what they have to look for. Here is the tip of the tip of the iceberg, from California's criminal jury instructions. The judge will say... The People must prove not only that the defendant did the acts charged, but also that (he/she) acted with a particular (intent/ [and/or] mental state). The instruction for (the/each) crime [and allegation] explains the (intent/ [and/or] mental state) required. A[n] (intent/ [and/or] mental state) may be proved by circumstantial evidence. Before you may rely on circumstantial evidence to conclude that a fact necessary to find the defendant guilty has been proved, you must be convinced that the People have proved each fact essential to that conclusion beyond a reasonable doubt. Also, before you may rely on circumstantial evidence to conclude that the defendant had the required (intent/ [and/or] mental state), you must be convinced that the only reasonable conclusion supported by the circumstantial evidence is that the defendant had the required (intent/ [and/or] mental state). If you can draw two or more reasonable conclusions from the circumstantial evidence, and one of those reasonable conclusions supports a finding that the defendant did have the required (intent/ [and/or] mental state) and another reasonable conclusion supports a finding that the defendant did not, you must conclude that the required (intent/ [and/or] mental state) was not proved by the circumstantial evidence. However, when considering circumstantial evidence, you must accept only reasonable conclusions and reject any that are unreasonable. and then there will be some specific elaboration of whether they have to find that the accused just generally intended to do bad, versus intended to specifically defraud.
In some states there is a law know as Caylee's Law, for example Connecticut General Statutes 53-21a(d) which requires reporting a child's disappearance: Any parent, guardian or person having custody or control, or providing supervision, of any child under the age of twelve years who knowingly fails to report the disappearance of such child to an appropriate law enforcement agency shall be guilty of a class A misdemeanor. For the purposes of this subsection, “disappearance of such child” means that the parent, guardian or person does not know the location of the child and has not had contact with the child for a twenty-four-hour period. Assume that they have done as the law requires, i.e. reporting the disappearance. It could be a crime for the parents to fake the kid's death, depending on what you did to "fake" the death. They might legally do things that could lead a person to think the child died; but telling the police, in the course of an investigation, that the child died in an accident, would be a crime. The parents would not have to convince the school district of anything, though someone at the school might alert the authorities that the child was gone (but they would know that anyway). They might well have to convince the police of something (i.e. that they didn't kill the child). It would certainly be a felony to lie to the IRS (i.e. claim the child as a dependent). It would also be a crime to continue to receive welfare payments or other benefits based on the fact of having a child.
In California (as in all states) there is a justifiable homicide defense which might be used in such a situation. For the force to be justified, you have to reasonably believe you are in danger of being harmed, that you need to use force to avoid the harm, and you may only use the minimum force necessary to eliminate the threat. It then is a matter for the jury to decide whether those principles were followed in your particular instance. The reason why it's hard to predict the outcome is that it depends on a subjective evaluation by the jury, as to whether the shooter had a reasonable fear and whether lesser force was a viable option. The jury's decision is guided by instructions to the jury (#506, #506) which focus on relevant distinctions. The jury will be told that "Belief in future harm is not sufficient, no matter how great or how likely the harm is believed to be", and that you have to reasonably believe there is "imminent danger of great bodily injury". My evaluation is that that does not describe the scenario in the question. There is some possibility of future harm... but not imminent harm. People v. Ceballos (1974) 12 Cal.3d 470" states that "the rule developed at common law that killing or use of deadly force to prevent a felony was justified only if the offense was a forcible and atrocious crime" and "Examples of forcible and atrocious crimes are murder, mayhem, rape and robbery", and that could support application of a justifiable homicide defense in a bank robbery. But in the present instance, the bank is being robbed and the shooter is a by-stander. Despite all of the bank robberies in California, there is no relevant case from which one could draw an analogy.
No, a later trial is not allowed A prosecutor can, and often will charge multiple related crimes, and all will be addressed at the same trial. But once a person has been acquitted on a given set of events, the same jurisdiction cannot re-try the same person on what is often called a lesser included offense. Nor on a greater offense implied by the same events. Not even if additional evidence comes to light. However, if an act (or set of acts) is a crime under both state law and Federal law, for example theft by deception (state crime) and wire fraud (federal crime) one jurisdiction may try the person even after ther has been an acquittal in the other. I think the same rule applies if an act is a crime within the jurisdiction of two different states, that both can trey the accused. In many cases prosecutors will choose not to bring the second trial, but they can if they see fit.