Does an absolute discharge result in a criminal record? In England and Wales, a court can impose an absolute discharge if it concludes that 'it is inexpedient to inflict punishment'. The power to do this is granted by s12(1) Powers of Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act 2000. Section 14(1) of the Act provides that&mdash; ... a conviction of an offence for which an order is made under section 12 above discharging the offender absolutely or conditionally shall be deemed not to be a conviction for any purpose other than the purposes of the proceedings in which the order is made ... However, the Crown Prosecution Service's guide to sentencing says this: Absolute discharge - no further action is taken, since either the offence was very minor, or the court considers that the experience has been enough of a deterrent. The offender will receive a criminal record. (emphasis mine in both extracts) If a person receives an absolute discharge and also a criminal record, surely this is treating the discharge as a conviction, which appears to fly in the face of s14(1) above. Does an absolute discharge result in a criminal record and, if so, how is this squared with s14(1) of the 2000 Act?
Yes, "The offender will receive a criminal record." But, you ask, "How is this squared with s14(1) of the 2000 Act?" Well, you will note that it states that it "shall be deemed not to be a conviction for any purpose other than the purposes of the proceedings." The key here is "other than the purposes of the proceedings" which means that, although there is no further punishment for your crime, you have still been convicted officially and it will be noted (on your record) as per the proceedings, and may be brought up in any subsequent proceedings ( "and of any subsequent proceedings which may be taken against the offender under section 13 above." ). You will also note section 12(7): "Nothing in this section shall be construed as preventing a court, on discharging an offender absolutely or conditionally in respect of any offence, from making an order for costs against the offender or imposing any disqualification on him or from making in respect of the offence an order under section 130, 143 or 148 below (compensation orders, deprivation orders and restitution orders)." Which further shows that an absolute discharge is not an absolute pardon, and should not be thought of as such. Rather, "You are very much guilty, but of such a minor crime that the experience of a trial has probably been enough, so we'll let you go without additional punishment."
united-states This answer is based upon general principles of criminal procedure in the United States which are quite similar in most states, although not necessarily exactly identical. The answer is likely to be different in other jurisdictions. If inadmissible evidence is offered by the prosecution and admitted at trial, this is a ground upon which the defense can move for a mistrial (which due to double jeopardy amounts to an acquittal), or upon which the defendant can appeal the conviction of the jury, if convicted. Acquittals of a defendant at trial cannot be appealed by the prosecution. But, to appeal, the error in admitting inadmissible evidence must be contemporaneously objected to by the defendant's lawyer (or the defendant if the defendant is not represented by counsel), or the admission of the evidence must be &quot;plain error&quot; (which is very rarely met on evidentiary issues). If the defendant's lawyer doesn't promptly say &quot;I object&quot; that ground for contesting a conviction is usually lost. Even then, the standard of review on appeal is whether the judge abused the judge's discretion in admitting the evidence, not whether the appellate court would have ruled the same way if presented with that evidentiary question. Also, even if there is an error, a conviction on a particular count will not be overruled if the error was &quot;harmless&quot;, which is to say that there is a reasonable possibility that admitting the inadmissible evidence caused the defendant to be convicted of that count. Often, if the evidence is overwhelming, or the inadmissible evidence wasn't that prejudicial, a conviction will be affirmed notwithstanding the admission of inadmissible evidence. Sometimes harmless error is evaluated considering all of the errors at trial as a whole, rather than individually, in addition to all of the other evidence admitted at trial. If an evidence issue can be foreseen and is central to the case (e.g. suppression of evidence of possession of drugs in a drug possession case), the issue of the admissibility of the evidence will often be resolved in a pre-trial hearing and subject to appeal then, prior to trial, rather than being resolved in the trial itself where the prosecution has no right to appeal, and the defendant risks conviction if the ruling goes against the defendant. If the conviction is overturned on appeal, the usual remedy is to remand the case to the same judge to conduct a new trial with a new jury, in a manner consistent with the appellate court's rulings.
“Serious harm” is a requirement in the Defamation Act 2013 The Supreme Court interpreted it in Lachaux v Independent Print Ltd &amp; Anor [2019] UKSC 27 (12 June 2019) at [10-20]: ... it not only raises the threshold of seriousness above that envisaged in Jameel (Yousef) and Thornton, but requires its application to be determined by reference to the actual facts about its impact and not just to the meaning of the words. You, as the plaintiff must prove on the balance of probabilities that you have or are likely to suffer serious harm. That is harm that is greater than the previous common law threshold of substantial. In this case, the court agreed that serious harm had been done so it’s useful to consider what Lord Sumption said about the evidence that had (correctly) convinced the trial judge at [21] (my emphasis): On the footing that (as I would hold) Mr Lachaux must demonstrate as a fact that the harm caused by the publications complained of was serious, Warby J held that it was. He heard evidence from Mr Lachaux himself and three other witnesses of fact, and received written evidence from his solicitor. He also received agreed figures, some of them estimates, of the print runs and estimated readership of the publications complained of and the user numbers for online publications. He based his finding of serious harm on (i) the scale of the publications; (ii) the fact that the statements complained of had come to the attention of at least one identifiable person in the United Kingdom who knew Mr Lachaux and (iii) that they were likely to have come to the attention of others who either knew him or would come to know him in future; and (iv) the gravity of the statements themselves, according to the meaning attributed to them by Sir David Eady. Mr Lachaux would have been entitled to produce evidence from those who had read the statements about its impact on them. But I do not accept, any more than the judge did, that his case must necessarily fail for want of such evidence. The judge’s finding was based on a combination of the meaning of the words, the situation of Mr Lachaux, the circumstances of publication and the inherent probabilities. There is no reason why inferences of fact as to the seriousness of the harm done to Mr Lachaux’s reputation should not be drawn from considerations of this kind. Warby J’s task was to evaluate the material before him, and arrive at a conclusion on an issue on which precision will rarely be possible. A concurrent assessment of the facts was made by the Court of Appeal. Findings of this kind would only rarely be disturbed by this court, in the absence of some error of principle potentially critical to the outcome. So, you must prove that it is likely that prospective employers/schools will see the defamatory statements and that they are so grave that it is likely that you would be refused a position because of them.
What is going to happen, could I get fined, placed in jail etc? Your summons should have explained the specific violation you're being charged with, and you could look up the relevant sections of the law. Assault is defined in Chapter 12 of the New Jersey Code of Criminal Justice. There are several types, and again, your summons should explain which one you are being charged with. My guess is it will probably be "simple assault", paragraph (a) (right at the beginning). This is defined as a "disorderly persons offense". Upon conviction, a disorderly persons offense is punishable in New Jersey by a term of up to 90 days in jail and probation, (section 2C:43-2 (b) (2)), and a fine of up to $1000 (section 2C:43-3 (c)). This represents the maximum. I do not know what kind of sentence is actually likely. It could depend on common practice in the state, the prosecutor's opinion of the severity of the crime, and the judge's discretion. A lawyer would be best qualified to help you find out how to contest the charge, or to receive a lesser sentence if convicted.
You are assuming that avoiding recidivism is the primary goal of a custodial sentence If that were the case, then the death penalty for every crime would be the most effective: not only do dead people not commit crime, they don’t even think about committing crime. Now, if you’re rebelling against that idea of the death penalty for shoplifting, that just demonstrates that criminal punishment has other goals than merely avoiding recidivism. Section 3A of the new-south-wales Crimes (Sentencing Procedure) Act 1999 codifies the common law: (a) to ensure that the offender is adequately punished for the offence, (b) to prevent crime by deterring the offender and other persons from committing similar offences, (c) to protect the community from the offender, (d) to promote the rehabilitation of the offender, (e) to make the offender accountable for his or her actions, (f) to denounce the conduct of the offender, (g) to recognise the harm done to the victim of the crime and to the community. Custodial sentences are good at (a), (e), (f), and possibly (g). In the short term they are good for (c) but not so good in the long term and they are terrible at (b) and (d). Of course, if you’re in a jurisdiction where judges are subject to political pressure, either directly by being elected, or indirectly, by not being independent, then the primary purpose of sentencing is to ensure the judge keeps their job or otherwise advances their career. This can be considered the central dilemma of democratic politics: you cant do “good” unless you have power but getting or keeping power might require you to do “bad’ things. As for whether there are studies statistically linking any of these objectives to sentence length, there are literally thousands.
Generally speaking if it is substantively unconstitutional for the government to punish a certain kind of criminal conduct, then this provides a basis for a &quot;collateral attack&quot; on the conviction to set it aside (in a post-conviction motion in state or federal court), even if the criminal defendant serving a sentence has already appealed the conviction directly (i.e. to the court of appeals and all higher appellate court that review that court of appeals) to the fullest extent possible and lost. But this is not self-executing. Someone has to file a court case on behalf of the person incarcerated to make it happen. It does not generally entitle the criminal defendant to compensation for wrongful incarceration or to a return of fines paid, although it would end the authority of the state to incarcerate the individual going forward or the compel that individual to pay the balance of unpaid fines. There might be a right to have the case sealed, but the ruling does not automatically remove the conviction from the criminal record of the defendant. And, getting the case sealed is likely to be harder in the circumstance where all of the sentence for the unconstitutional offense has been fully served. When a past conviction does not meet the standards of current law from a procedural context, in contrast, this may be raised in pending direct appeals, but is rarely something that can be brought up in a post-decision collateral attack on the conviction unless certain other exceptions apply (e.g. sometimes if a collateral attack pending before the decision is still pending at the time of the decision or in certain extraordinary cases involving due process concerns that cast deep doubt on the validity of all convictions obtained by that means), and even in cases where it is set aside, does not pose a double jeopardy bar against a new prosecution for the crime that meets the appropriate procedural standards. The U.S. Supreme Court is currently considering the proper treatment under these rules of its holding that non-unanimous juries were an unconstitutional manner by which to convict someone of a felony, which is a procedural rule, but may fall within the exception that makes the new rule retroactive anyway. For cases on direct review, a new rule for the conduct of criminal prosecutions is to be applied retroactively to all cases, state or federal, pending on direct review or not yet final, with no exception for cases in which the new rule constitutes a ‘clear break’ with the past Justice Harlan's habeas approach was first adopted by a plurality in Teague v. Lane and then by the Court in Penry v. Lynaugh. Thus, for collateral review in federal courts of state court criminal convictions, the general rule is that new rules of constitutional interpretation—those not 'dictated by precedent existing at the time the defendant's conviction became final'—will not be applied. However, [a] new rule applies retroactively in a collateral proceeding only if (1) the rule is substantive or (2) the rule is a 'watershed rul[e] of criminal procedure' implicating the fundamental fairness and accuracy of the criminal proceeding. Put another way, a new rule will be applied in a collateral proceeding only if it places certain kinds of conduct beyond the power of the criminal law-making authority to prescribe or constitutes a new procedure[ ] without which the likelihood of an accurate conviction is seriously diminished. In Montgomery v. Louisiana, the Court extended the holding of Teague beyond the context of federal habeas review, such that when a new substantive rule of constitutional law controls the outcome of a case, state collateral review courts must give retroactive effect to that rule in the same manner as federal courts engaging in habeas review. As a result, at least with regard to the first exception, the Court has held that the Teague rule is constitutionally based, as substantive rules set forth categorical guarantees that place certain laws and punishments beyond a state’s power, making the resulting conviction or sentence . . . by definition . . . unlawful. In contrast, procedural rules are those that are aimed at enhancing the accuracy of a conviction or sentence by regulating the manner of determining the defendant’s guilt. As a consequence, with respect to a defendant who did not receive the benefit of a new procedural rule, the possibility exists that the underlying conviction or sentence may still be accurate and the defendant’s continued confinement may still be lawful under the Constitution. In this vein, the Court has described a substantive rule as one that alters the range of conduct that the law punishes, or that prohibits a certain category of punishment for a class of defendants because of their status or offense. Under the second exception it is not enough under Teague to say that a new rule is aimed at improving the accuracy of a trial. More is required. A rule that qualifies under this exception must not only improve accuracy, but also alter our understanding of the bedrock procedural elements essential to the fairness of a proceeding. From here.
england-and-wales The law on this point in England and Wales has recently changed. The main statute here is section 4 of the Animal Welfare Act 2006, amended in 2019 to add an exception relevant to police dogs. Under subsection (1), you commit an offence if you cause a dog (as an example of a &quot;protected animal&quot;) to suffer unnecessarily. The necessity conditions in subsection (3) include the example of protecting yourself or someone else, in (3)(c)(ii), but this list is not exhaustive. Nonetheless, that specific defence is excluded by the new subsection (3A) in the case when the dog is a police dog being used by an officer &quot;in a way that was reasonable in all the circumstances&quot;. This exception was added precisely to cover the example of a police dog being used to apprehend a suspect, to stop people from claiming self-defence; it's known as &quot;Finn's Law&quot; after a police dog who was stabbed in those circumstances. If this came up in practice, for the scenario you suggest, then the court would have to deal with (among other things): Was the officer's conduct reasonable in all the circumstances? Could the person have avoided harming the animal? Was the level of harm to the animal proportionate? The answers would depend on the exact facts involved, so it's not possible to say in a vacuum whether the elements of the offence could be proved. Note that the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991, which might otherwise apply to the officer in charge of the dog for letting it be &quot;dangerously out of control&quot;, actually does not by virtue of section 10(3) so long as it is being used &quot;for a lawful purpose&quot;. Meanwhile, as a civil matter, there is a strict liability provision in the Animals Act 1971 which might catch police dogs. That Act distinguishes between animals of a dangerous species, where the liability always applies, and others where it only applies if the animal meets certain conditions. These have attracted some criticism by senior judges over unclarity in their drafting - see for example Ford v Seymour-Williams [2021] EWCA Civ 1848 and Mirvahedy v Henley [2003] UKHL 16 - but on the basis of those decisions, one could argue that the likelihood of the damage or of its being severe was due to characteristics of the animal which are not normally found in animals of the same species in the case of a police dog specifically trained to attack on command. However, on the other side, whether the claim is under the Animals Act, or for battery, etc.: The police may argue that the damage was due to the suspect's own fault. An example I found cited in Street on Torts is Dhesi v Chief Constable of West Midlands Police [2000] WL 491455. A claimant bitten by a police dog was held to have accepted the risk of sustaining damage when he refused to come out of his hiding place, after being warned a dog would be sent in to flush him out; this engaged section 5(1) of the Animals Act and defeated strict liability. The police can argue that their use of force was reasonable for the purpose of preventing crime and/or arresting a suspect. (The same argument by which human officers can use force.) The police can argue that the dog was no more dangerous than an ordinary dog, that the officer did not know it could cause such severe damage, etc., thus removing it from the category of animals where strict liability applies. The police have some protection from civil suit, known as &quot;Hill immunity&quot; after the case Hill v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police [1988] UKHL 12, which is not absolute but is very likely to defeat claims where officers were not unusually negligent, not acting outside the bounds of their duties, exercised reasonable care and skill, or did the best they could in a fast and confusing situation. See the recent judgements in Robinson v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police [2018] UKSC 4, a case where officers arresting a suspect accidentally hurt an elderly lady, for a very thorough discussion of duty to bystanders and police negligence in general. So again, it all depends on the fact pattern in the specific case, but you may or may not be able to win a civil claim against the police based on the harm done to you by a police dog, even when you didn't hurt the dog.
In England and Wales, theft is defined by s1 Theft Act 1968: A person is guilty of theft if he dishonestly appropriates property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it It does not matter if the victim is not the rightful owner of the property, as the law only requires that the property belongs to another: the victim and owner can be two different people. As long as the other elements are present, the offence is committed. It's important when considering theft to look for dishonesty and intention to permanently deprive: borrowing something without permission with the intention to return it isn't theft, and nor is taking something by mistake. Theft is an 'either-way' offence (i.e. it can be tried summarily or by a jury), and in the latter case carries a maximum penalty of seven years in prison (s7 TA 1968).