Can any crime be a federal crime in the US? As an example, can the US Congress declare that jaywalking is a federal offense? Or would the jaywalker have to cross a state border in order for the crime to become prosecutable by federal authorities?
Legally, no, Congress can't pass laws just because it feels like it. Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution contains a set of powers Congress has.* Other sections give Congress additional powers. Elsewhere in Article I, Congressional consent is required for states to make interstate agreements, keep military forces in peacetime, and impose tariffs. It's implied that Congress may suspend habeas corpus in the event of rebellion or invasion. Article III provides another authority for Congress to establish courts, allows Congress to regulate the appellate jurisdiction of the Supreme Court, and allows Congress to fix a penalty for treason. Article IV lets Congress make rules about interstate recognition of judgments and official records and gives Congress the power to make rules governing property owned by the United States. Many amendments give Congress even more powers (generally by saying something like &quot;Congress has the authority to enforce this amendment&quot;). The 13th Amendment says Congress can ban slavery. The 14th Amendment says Congress can enforce its provisions (which require states to give due process and equal protection). The 15th, 19th, 24th, and 26th Amendments expanded voting rights and gave Congress the power to enforce them. Etc. So Congress has a lot of powers, but the key is that their powers are enumerated. For any federal law, you can ask what authority Congress used to enact that law. However, there's a world of difference between what powers Congress technically has and what powers they practically have. The final enumerated power is to pass all laws which are necessary and proper for carrying out some other power. Sometimes, this is a fairly direct extension of the applicable power. Nothing in the Constitution explicitly says Congress can pass a law against harboring deserters, but it's a law which is important for ensuring that the US can field an army. Sometimes, though, the link is very tenuous. If you read federal laws, they often contain the phrase &quot;in or affecting interstate or foreign commerce.&quot; Just about everything can be tied to commerce in some way or another, and interstate commerce is something Congress has the power to regulate. Regulating interstate commerce is the justification for DOT regulation of long-haul trucking, which is clearly commercial. It's also the justification for antidiscrimination laws, because discrimination had a serious chilling effect on travel within the country (hard to visit a city if there's no hotel that will accept you). It's also the justification for banning the growth and consumption of marijuana for personal use, under the theory that even though it's illegal to trade it across state lines, there is in fact an (illegal) interstate market and growing your own might in some way affect that market. The courts very rarely strike down laws on the basis that they fall outside Congress's enumerated powers. They did in a case in the 1990s about the Federal Gun-Free School Zones Act, but Congress then amended it to say it only applied to guns if the gun or any of its components at some point traveled in interstate or foreign commerce (which is almost every gun). More recently, the Supreme Court upheld a law against personal growth of marijuana for personal consumption. The powers in Article I, Section 8 are: The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States; To borrow money on the credit of the United States; To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes; To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States; To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures; To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States; To establish post offices and post roads; To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries; To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court; To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations; To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water; To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years; To provide and maintain a navy; To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces; To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions; To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress; To exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular states, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States, and to exercise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings;--And To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof.
The US legal system deals with this by punishing you for the crimes of which you are convicted. That is, those where the evidence (whatever it is) convinces a jury that you are guilty beyond reasonable doubt. If there is insufficient evidence, for whatever reason then you would not be convicted. The prosecution can, subject to admissibility, put forward whatever evidence they like in order to convince the jury. This can include a pile of ash that they allege contained convincing and unambiguous evidence of guilt. Of course, if that's all they've got the prosecution would probably be censured by the judge for wasting everybody's time and money, more likely, a prosecutor wouldn't lay charges in the first place. As to punishment for an evidence tampering conviction: you have been convicted of evidence tampering, not drug production so you will be punished for evidence tampering, not drug production. The legislature sets different punishments for these for a reason, possibly a reason known only to them but a reason nevertheless. The judge has discretion to apply anything between the minimum and maximum sentence prescribed. A conviction for evidence tampering in a drug case rather than, say, a jaywalking case, is likely to get a more severe sentence all else being equal.
We need a jurisdiction, because burglary is a statutory crime. Since this is a residence, in Washington, under RCW 9A.52.025(1), the trespasser might have committed residential burglary: A person is guilty of residential burglary if, with intent to commit a crime against a person or property therein, the person enters or remains unlawfully in a dwelling other than a vehicle. While other states may have a provision requiring intent to commit a felony, or intent to commit a crime other than trespassing, the Washington statute does not say "felony" or "other than trespassing". A person can enter unlawfully by accident, or with no intention to be there unlawfully, in which case the person committed the act without the requisite criminal intent. If a person intends to enter but not remain, and they enter, they have committed the misdemeanor of trespassing. The question of whether unlawful entering with the intent to unlawfully remain satisfies the "intent to commit a crime" called for in the Washington statute has not been directly addressed in case law, as far as I know. While the state generally shoulders the burden of proving beyond reasonable doubt the elements of the crime, in Washington, under RCW 9A.52.040, the accused may bear the burden of disproving intent (this is a permissive inference on the fact-finder's part): In any prosecution for burglary, any person who enters or remains unlawfully in a building may be inferred to have acted with intent to commit a crime against a person or property therein, unless such entering or remaining shall be explained by evidence satisfactory to the trier of fact to have been made without such criminal intent. This does not mean that the state shoulders no burden of proof regarding intent, according to State v. Newton: A jury may, however, infer the defendant's specific criminal intent from his or her conduct if it is not "'patently equivocal'" and instead 'plainly indicates such intent as a matter of logical probability' In this instance, the burglary conviction was overturned because no evidence shows his intent was anything other than to show her she could walk The relevant fact is that the accused was under the influence of PCP, and believed that God had told him that his disabled mother could walk, and he broke into the residence to tell her this. Pursuant to State v. Bergeron where the conviction for attempted burglary was upheld, the court held that The intent to commit a specific named crime inside the burglarized premises is not an "element" of the crime of burglary in the State of Washington... The intent required by our burglary statutes is simply the intent to commit any crime against a person or property inside the burglarized premises The court observed in this case that "there is absolutely no evidence in the record to prove what specific crime it was the defendant intended to commit inside". What distinguishes Bergeron from Newton (the latter, not precedential, citing the former) is that there was a good case that Bergeron had an intent to commit some crime, though not a specific identifiable crime; but for Newton, there was no evidence that defendant intended to commit any crime whatsoever, even remaining unlawfully. In the hypothetical instance, the fact that the criminal smashed a vase is evidence of an intent to commit a crime (destruction of property). It's unlikely that a mere assertion "I just did that on the spur of the moment" would carry any weight. If the circumstances make it more likely that he entered intending to do something wrong, such as vandalism, the elements of burglary are present/ If the defendant claims some innocent reason for trespassing, such as escaping a riot, he may avail himself of a defense (RCW 9a.52.090) that The actor reasonably believed that the owner of the premises, or other person empowered to license access thereto, would have licensed him or her to enter or remain If there is no evidence of a riot, such a defense is not credible. Alternatively, if the house is for sale, the "I thought it would be okay" defense is more credible.
Be careful: from the Wikipedia article, it appears that there is a state criminal trial and there will be a federal criminal trial. In addition, there is a federal civil suit which incorporates some stats law claims. The defense in each trial may be different. Have you read the complaint in the civil case? As an example, count 1 alleges, in paragraph 214, that the defendants' actions were &quot;without legal cause.&quot; An obvious defense is to show that the actions were actually justified under the law. The law under which they would have been justified would be state law. It's still possible that the state law justification isn't sufficient, but that is another point to be argued in court. If they can't prevail in showing that state law did authorize their actions then the act was certainly unlawful under both state and federal law. Do defendants have standing to invoke self-defense given the context or did they give this up at some point in time? Standing is a threshold that plaintiffs must meet. But defendants can certainly argue self defense. Whether they can prevail on that argument depends on the facts of the case as determined by the court, in particular by the &quot;finder of fact,&quot; which is the jury in a jury trial and the judge in a bench trial. The facts that I'm aware of in the public record suggest that the defendants would not prevail on such an argument, but that doesn't deprive them of the right to advance it in court. If someone claims that Arbery was grabbing for the shotgun then the defendants have a right to introduce any evidence of that fact that they may have. It is for the finder of fact to judge the credibility of the evidence.
If I attempt to carry such a product into the country, but then honestly declare it at the border (I would like to declare 10 kg of marijuana, sir), can I be prosecuted for attempted smuggling? This depends on the jurisdiction and its definition of "smuggling." In the US, as an example, smuggling implies fraud or "clandestine" action. Openly bringing a forbidden item and declaring it would not meet the definition of this crime. Or will I simply be faced with the choice of turning around or forfeiting my goods and continue without trouble? Depending on the product in question, probably not. In the marijuana example, even if you are not guilty of smuggling, you are guilty of possessing and transporting a controlled substance (see 21 USC subchapter I). You could also be charged with intent to distribute, which would likely be a more serious crime. You could also be charged under the laws of the state in which the port of entry is located. With regard to the methyl alcohol example, I do not know whether bringing it to the customs desk at a port of entry would constitute a crime.
The US Supreme Court only has jurisdiction in federal matters. So if someone is suing under federal law, or there is a constitutional question, the Supreme Court is the place to go for a definitive answer. However, states have their own laws. The Supreme Court cannot tell New York that it must apply the attractive nuisance doctrine, as it is neither a matter of federal law nor a constitutional matter. New York is free to make its own laws on the subject, and the New York courts are free to interpret those laws as they see fit. In fact, federal courts are required to defer to New York's interpretation if New York's laws apply to the case, even if the case is in federal court for some reason (like diversity of parties.) See the Erie doctrine (which, coincidentally, involves yet another case about railroad injuries.)
It's a bit of an oversimplification. You're correct that there is a federal law against murder, 18 USC 1111. However it applies only to a murder committed in the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States. This covers situations like crimes committed on federal lands such as national parks or federal buildings, or crimes on US-flagged ships at sea, aircraft in flight, or in space. It does not apply to &quot;ordinary&quot; crimes committed at most locations within the US. 18 USC Chapter 51 covers a few other situations, such as murder of a federal officer, foreign diplomat, by incarcerated or escaped federal prisoners, US nationals murdering each other while abroad, and so forth. The idea is that these restrictions keep the laws within the enumerated powers of Congress as stated in Article I Section 8 of the US Constitution. A federal statute covering all murders throughout the US would probably be unconstitutional for this reason. So while what he says is not strictly correct, it is true that in the vast majority of cases, murders are covered by state laws and not by federal laws. Even if one was to agree with Ramaswamy that medical abortions are a form of murder, even still, no federal murder law currently on the books would apply to a typical abortion, except under very unusual circumstances.
The US has jurisdiction because you committed a crime in the US. Canada has jurisdiction because you committed a crime in Canada. As added complications, if you are a Mexican citizen then Mexico has jurisdiction and if your victim is Chinese then China has jurisdiction. If you get arrested on an Interpol warrant in Spain then Spain has jurisdiction. And so on ... Your implicit assumption is that jurisdiction is exclusive, it isn't. Any country (or sub-national jurisdiction) that claims jurisdiction has jurisdiction, at least to the extent of testing that claim. Whether any given polity has jurisdiction depends on the particular law involved, some laws are only applicable within that countries borders others are extra-territorial, some are applicable to citizens but not non-citizens or vice-versa, etc.