What is actually the difference between a *crime* and a *civil wrong*? I have two questions I'd like some help on, the answers to which potentially depend on each other. The first is a working definition for a civil wrong (as opposed to a crime). The second is whether all civil wrongs constitute crimes and hence can be regarded as illegal acts. A crime is generally defined as an act or omission that is prohibited by law. Thus, from what I understand, states will have various statutes that are passed by their respective legislatures defining what acts/omissions constitute crimes in their jurisdiction as well as what their potential punishments will be. For example, California may have a law written in a statute somewhere saying that an individual may not assault someone and that the penalty is no more than 2 years imprisonment etc. Now suppose someone in California bumps into someone else walking on the pavement (accidently) causing the other to fall and injure themselves. In this case, because the action of bumping into someone had no malice aforethought (it was accidental), we could say that the individual has not in fact committed a crime but instead has possibly committed a civil wrong (a tort). If this is the case, are there statutes in each respective state defining exactly what acts and omissions constitute civil wrongs? If there are statutes defining these civil wrongs, surely this would mean that all actions/omissions defined by statute to be civil wrongs are also in fact prohibited by law ? (since there exists a statute stating that the act/omission carries with it a potential penalty etc). If this is true, all civil wrongs must necessarily be crimes as well as civil wrongs since they are prohibited by law because a statute declaring a potential penalty for an act/omission is functionally a prohibition by law. Am I correct in my thinking here? Is it the case that all civil wrongs are necessarily crimes because they constitute actions/omissions that are prohibited by law (since there exists statutes defining them and their potential penalties)?
The detailed answer depends on the jurisdiction that you are asking about (e.g. Saudi Arabia, France, US or specifically California): my answer is about the US. You should note that the term &quot;crime&quot; originally comes from Ancient Greek κρίμα, which means &quot;decision; judgment&quot;: the word form is pretty stable, compared to the concepts that it is associated with. When the legal system changes, the referent of &quot;crime&quot; changes. Some facts about how the words are used are because of historically earlier concepts. At an earlier stage of English law, there was no distinction between crimes and civil wrongs, there were simply wrongs (&quot;tort&quot;, in French). In contemporary American practice, &quot;crime&quot; is a sub-type of offense against the government, the other being an &quot;infraction&quot; (such as a parking ticket). &quot;Civil wrong&quot; encompasses breaches of contract, breaches of trust, and &quot;torts&quot; such as trespassing and assault, and have in common that they are wrongs against an individual. If you commit a crime, it is you against the government, and one set of principles is adhered to in deciding guilt. If you commit a civil wrong, it is you against the individual (though it may be that the government acts as the mouthpiece when e.g. the &quot;citizens of California&quot; have been each wronged), and different principles are adhered to in deciding liability. The distinction can be murky given overlap in certain cases, for example assault is both a crime, as dictated by statutory law and punishable by prison time, and also a tort (sub-type of civil wrong) as recognized at common law (traditionally recognized since the 13th century in England), and passed on to modern America. You can sue a person for the tort of assault, but the government prosecutes you for committing the statutory offense of assault. In the case of a lawsuit over assault, you seek compensation for the harm done do you, you do not seek punishment for an offense against society. That is the function of criminal law, to define the acts which may be punished. Most states in the US have done away with &quot;common law crimes&quot;, but as far as I know the remnants of common law crime in the US are limited to &quot;definitions&quot; – punishments are set out in statutory law. An example of common law definitional inheritance is &quot;assault&quot; under Washington law, where assault includes poisoning, transmitting HIV, and assaulting in various ways (relying on the common law definition of &quot;assault&quot;). This common law definition is then transmitted to the juror via a set of instructions, which summarize the case law that defines &quot;assault&quot;. As you can see, there is a bright line between crimes and civil wrongs, so it is plainly not the case that all civil wrongs are crimes. A number of civil wrongs are statutorily defined (e.g. copyright infringement), and there is in the US a tendency to statutorily encode the essentials of civil wrongs as well as crimes. You are probably right that crime is &quot;generally&quot; defined as an act or omission prohibited by law, where &quot;generally&quot; means &quot;by most people&quot;, but that is because most people don't have a clear understanding of &quot;law&quot;, &quot;statute&quot; and &quot;common law&quot;. Here in Law SE, we tend to use &quot;legal&quot; in a very broad sense, meaning &quot;would probably be allowed and not incur any sanction by the courts&quot;. Copyright infringement is not (necessarily) a crime, but it is prohibited by law, thus &quot;prohibited by law&quot; is not a good definition of crime. Because of the distinction between &quot;crime&quot; and &quot;infraction&quot;, both of which are cases of the individual vs. the government, &quot;crime&quot; has to be defined in terms of a specific aspect of the statutory law, the punishment. You can be imprisoned for committing a crime, but not for an infraction, such as a parking ticket. In Washington, &quot;infraction&quot; is defined with reference to Title 76, 77, 79, or 79A RCW or RCW 7.84.030(2)(b) that &quot;is declared not to be a criminal offense and is subject to the provisions of this chapter&quot;, such as fishing with barbed hooks. Even though the government is the prosecutor in such a case, the offense is defined is said to be &quot;civil in nature&quot;. In other words, the distinction is anything but clear.
Yes, but the difference is in nuance, not substance Illegal means “not according to or authorized by law” and lists unlawful as a synonym. Unlawful means “not lawful” with illegal as a synonym. So, by definition, they mean the same thing and can be used interchangeably. Illegal does carry a slight hint of being more egregious than unlawful and would be more often used of criminality than of a parking offense but it’s not wrong to use them interchangeably.
It depends on the law For example, the NSW Crimes Act 1900 s18 defines murder and manslaughter: (1) (a) Murder shall be taken to have been committed where the act of the accused, or thing by him or her omitted to be done, causing the death charged, was done or omitted with reckless indifference to human life, or with intent to kill or inflict grievous bodily harm upon some person, or done in an attempt to commit, or during or immediately after the commission, by the accused, or some accomplice with him or her, of a crime punishable by imprisonment for life or for 25 years. (b) Every other punishable homicide shall be taken to be manslaughter. (2) (a) No act or omission which was not malicious, or for which the accused had lawful cause or excuse, shall be within this section. (b) No punishment or forfeiture shall be incurred by any person who kills another by misfortune only. It is possible that the acts you describe could be prosecuted as either murder or manslaughter. For murder the prosecutor would need to prove that they are an &quot;act by the accused ... causing the death charged, was done ... with reckless indifference to human life&quot; - the hard part is the causal link. For manslaughter it is clear that the act &quot;was ... malicious&quot; and that there was no &quot;lawful excuse&quot; - some cause and effect would need to be demonstrated still. However, the prosecutor has a more certain option under s31C: 31C Aiding etc suicide ... (2) Where: (a) a person incites or counsels another person to commit suicide, and (b) that other person commits, or attempts to commit, suicide as a consequence of that incitement or counsel, the firstmentioned person shall be liable to imprisonment for 5 years. It is important to look at the legal definition of a crime to determine if a given set of circumstances meets all the required elements.
One does not introduce statutes in a trial, criminal of civil. Rather, one introduces facts. The judge will present &quot;the law&quot;, and will present it in a digested form in the form of interpreted instructions to the jury about what the law says. Jurors are not required to interpret the meaning of statutes, because jurors are also not expected to know the relevant case law surrounding a statute. A party might make a motion to the judge where the argument depends in part on the wording of a statute. Then there is a standard but jurisdiction-dependent way of referring to s statute, e.g. ORS 164.015, RCW 9A.56.010. For Minnesota there are three interchangeable forms: &quot;Minnesota Statutes 2008, section 123.45, subdivision 6&quot; which is the same as &quot;MINN. STAT. 123.45 (2008)&quot; or &quot;MINN. STAT. ANN. 123.45 (2008)&quot;, which is for statutes. You have to look it up on a jurisdiction by jurisdiction basis – here is the answer that Minnesota gives (all legal citations).
Malum prohibitum can be defined as An act which is immoral because it is illegal; not necessarily illegal because it is immoral. while malum in se can be defined as An innately immoral act, regardless of whether it is forbidden by law. Examples include adultery, theft, and murder. A side-by-side comparison is given here: Legal scholars have used the terms mala prohibita and mala in se to draw the distinction between legally proscribed and morally proscribed offenses. The former are those offenses that are wrong simply because there exist formal, codified rules prohibiting them. Efforts to define mala in se, on the other hand, have resulted in vague, often conflicting meanings that leave the analyst with little but examples to serve as definitions. As a result, some have argued that the distinctions mala in se and mala prohibita be abandoned altogether. If one examines mala in se from an equity theoretical viewpoint, incorporating the concepts of intent and harm, it may be possible to arrive at a more understandable and useful concept. In theory, the two are easy to distinguish, but in cases of, say, statutory rape, the differences fade away.
In the US this is generally governed by state law: RCW 4.24.350 in Washington state. The criminal jury is not empowered to make such a decision, but a separate civil trial for malicious prosecution would be possible. Plaintif (ex defedant) would have to prove that the action was instituted with knowledge that the same was false, and unfounded, malicious and without probable cause in the filing of such action, or that the same was filed as a part of a conspiracy to misuse judicial process by filing an action known to be false and unfounded The basis for the lawsuit would be the objective facts that prove that the prosecution was false and malicious, and not the fact of acquittal or the subjective opinion of a juror.
Its always the simple questions that have complicated answers. In this case its because both Common Law and Civil Law have several different meanings. Civil Law v Criminal Law In this context, civil law means the ability of people to seek redress for wrongs from other people. These people may be individuals (natural persons) or legal persons (corporations, government etc.). When someone sues someone else they are using civil law. In contrast, criminal law is where a government prosecutes (not sues) a person (again natural or legal) who is alleged to have committed an offence. To illustrate the difference, if a person murders another person the government will use criminal law to prosecute the murder and the family of the victim will use civil law to pursue a wrongful death suit. Common Law v Civil Law In this context, common law and civil law refer to two of the major legal systems in use on Earth: By Maximilian Dörrbecker (Chumwa) - Own work, using World map by Canuckguy and others UNESCO World Heritage map by NNW The data sources are:University of Ottawa: JuriGlobe – World Legal Systems Research Group Wikipedia: List of national legal systems European legal systems map by Ain92 and others (which seems to be based on this map by C.Löser and others) World legal systems map by Robinkissac, CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=40154967 Common Law is derived from the law of England and is used in areas colonized by the English - the UK, Canada, the USA, Australia and New Zealand. Civil Law is derived from continental European law and ultimately from Roman law. The primary contrast between the two systems is the role of written decisions and precedent. In common law jurisdictions, nearly every case that presents a bona fide disagreement on the law is resolved in a written opinion. In contrast, civil law decisions typically do not include explanatory opinions. In common law systems, a single decided case is binding law to the same extent as statute or regulation, under the principle of stare decisis. In contrast, in civil law systems, individual decisions have only advisory, not binding effect. In civil law systems, case law only acquires weight when a long series of cases use consistent reasoning, called jurisprudence constante. Civil law lawyers consult case law to obtain their best prediction of how a court will rule, but comparatively, civil law judges are less bound to follow it. For that reason, statutes in civil law systems are more comprehensive, detailed, and continuously updated, covering all matters capable of being brought before a court. The United States and 49 of the states are Common Law jurisdictions, the exception is Louisiana which is a Civil Law jurisdiction (specifically the Napoleonic subset of Civil Law) as, unlike the rest of the country, it was initially a French possession. Common Law v Common Law In addition to the way the term is used above, &quot;common law&quot; can be used within a Common Law jurisdiction to distinguish that part of the law which arises from judicial precedent from that part which arises from legislative statute or administrative regulation. Further, within legal argument, the term may be used to distinguish &quot;common law&quot; (or just &quot;law&quot;) from equity. Before 1873, England had two parallel court systems: courts of &quot;law&quot; which could only award money damages and recognized only the legal owner of property, and courts of &quot;equity&quot; (courts of chancery) that could issue injunctive relief (that is, a court order to a party to do something, give something to someone, or stop doing something) and recognized trusts of property.
Yes. It is a crime almost everywhere to throw something at someone, even if it causes little or no injury. Usually it would be classified as "assault and battery" although if it damages clothing or other property, it could also be called, for example, "criminal mischief" which is intentional damage to property. It would also be a tort that could be enforced with civil damages in most places, although only nominal damages would be awarded and there would be no award for attorneys' fees. In practice, however, few people would press charges or turn to the police in such an incident, few police would take action based on the complaint because it is so trivial, and few people would sue in such a case. For what it is worth, the "living law" in Japan recognizes that someone has a duty to pay to clean your clothes or replace them if they can't be cleaned in such circumstances and most people appear to comply with that obligation without court involvement if the victim insists. Also, pie throwing as a political protest in Europe is also almost surely illegal under European law, although, again, this is rarely enforced by common political culture and tradition.