Is receiving support from an enemy (i.e. reverse treason) a crime? I think committing treason, in the U.S. constitution, can involve giving aid &amp; comfort to our enemies. What if the enemy gives aid &amp; comfort to you instead? Is that treason? Is it covered by a different crime? (This is inspired by a recent Presidential candidate asking, maybe sarcastically, a foreign power for help over his opponent's documentation.)
What if the enemy gives aid &amp; comfort to you instead? Is that treason? Is it covered by a different crime? This is not treason on the part of the recipient, although it could involve receipt of a bribe, or failure to register as a foreign agent, if it were in exchange for the performance or expected performance of some official act or a fee for service. Motives and the identity of the donor would matter. Also, "enemy" is a term of art in the law of war and the law of treason in the United States. Basically, it means someone who is a national of a country which the U.S. is in a declared war. Other than members of some some terrorist groups (including ISIS), and possibly citizens of North Korea, I do not believe that anyone else in the world counts as an "enemy" at this time for legal purposes. The U.S. Constitution in Article 1, Section 9, Clause 8 does specify that it is improper to receive "emoluments" from a foreign power. It says: [N]o Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them [i.e., the United States], shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State. In other words, no federal government official may receive any gift or title from a foreign government or monarch. State Department protocol ratified by Congress mandates that when gift from a foreign government or monarch is received by a U.S. government official because international etiquette requires it, that it be turned over to the United States government to become federal government property as soon as it is reasonably practical to do so without offending the donor, since the purpose is to prevent a government official from personally benefitting from his or her office. I suspect that it is a crime to receive an emolement without turning it over to the U.S. if you are a federal official whether or not an "enemy" provided it. If I have time I will look up the chapter and verse.
I think the officer is probably lying, not just mistaken, but they are not required to always be truthful. In addition to the law against possessing ID with intent to commit, or to aid or abet, any crime, it is also against the law to be knowingly in possession of a stolen credit card, or any other property. An example of a strict-liability possession crime, which the officer knows of, is that it is a crime to possess heroin, period. I am skeptical that the officer actually believes that there is a law making it a crime to be in possession of a credit card with permission, and suspect that he thinks it is stolen.
Supporting a secessionist movement is protected by the First Amendment. Terrorism, in the name of a secessionist movement or otherwise, or support of terrorism is a federal offense. See 18 USC 2339A and 2339B. The latter applies to foreign terrorist organizations, the former applies to to anything in violation of a specific list of crimes (§§32, 37, 81, 175, 229, 351, 831, 842(m) or (n), 844(f) or (i), 930(c), 956, 1091, 1114, 1116, 1203, 1361, 1362, 1363, 1366, 1751, 1992, 2155, 2156, 2280, 2281, 2332, 2332a, 2332b, 2332f, 2340A, 2442 of Title 18, and a few other things). Advocating secesion is not a crime, so supporting the advocacy of secession – in the US – is not a crime. §2339B determines what terrorist-organization status via 18 USC 1189, which is basically a finding by the Secretary of State, in consultation with the Secretary of the Treasury and the Attorney General that &quot;the organization threatens the security of United States nationals or the national security of the United States&quot;. Here is a current list. Advocating the forceful overthrow of the US government or that of any state or lower political subdivision is a crime under 18 USC 2385, likewise abetting, advising, or teaching the duty, necessity, desirability, or propriety of such overthrow.
Nobody so far has discussed Electoral law e.g. Representation of the People Act 1983 There are various clauses that may be relevant, one of which is: A voter shall be guilty of bribery if before or during an election he directly or indirectly by himself or by any other person on his behalf receives, agrees, or contracts for any money, gift, loan or valuable consideration, office, place or employment for himself or for any other person for voting or agreeing to vote or for refraining or agreeing to refrain from voting. Subsection 2 similarly makes it an offence to offer employment to induce any voter to vote or refrain from voting but somewhat less concisely. I believe this would make such a contract unenforceable.
As mentioned in a comment by @Dancrumb, the exact policies of each local police department will be different, and there are thousands of them. There is a relevant requirement at the Federal level according the Department of Justice, but it is not clear to me to what extent this applies to peers and not just supervisors: An officer who purposefully allows a fellow officer to violate a victim's Constitutional rights may be prosecuted for failure to intervene to stop the Constitutional violation. To prosecute such an officer, the government must show that the defendant officer was aware of the Constitutional violation, had an opportunity to intervene, and chose not to do so. This charge is often appropriate for supervisory officers who observe uses of excessive force without stopping them, or who actively encourage uses of excessive force but do not directly participate in them.
An "inquisitorial" system is one where the Judge or Magistrate actively questions the accused and witnesses to attempt to determine the facts. The Judge may also determine, at least in part, what witnesses to call in what order. An "adversarial" system is one in which each side presents its case, and the judge acts as an umpire deciding on procedure, and possibly makes the final ruling (or directs a jury to do so) but is not actively involved in questioning witnesses or deciding what witnesses to call. I don't see anything which would prevent a common-law jurisdiction from establishing an "inquisitorial" system by statute except longstanding tradition, but as far as i know no such jurisdiction has ever had such a system in place for dealing with criminal matters. The informal procedures in some small claims courts do have judges more actively involved than in other courts. I think this is also true in some family courts as well. I think I have heard of some civil-law jurisdictions which use something like an adversary system, but i am not sure of that. Certainly a civil-law country could pass a law setting up such a system if it chose to.
There are literally hundreds of such laws. Most of them (perhaps all, if we exclude firearms-related crimes in Title 26) are contained in Title 18 of the US Code, part I. The problem is that your definition of "public insurrection" is too broad, since it would include lying to federal agents (a crime), insofar as the reason for 18 USC 1001 is to prevent impeding federal investigations by giving them false information. Assaulting a federal agent impedes government and is a crime. There is pretty much a federal version of any state-level crime of violence. There is the riot act, and a specific law against insurrection and rebellion. Chapter 115 is probably the most relevant: this is where the various "overthrowing the government" laws are.
Here are the suggested federal jury instructions for aiding and abetting: To "aid and abet" means intentionally to help someone else commit a crime. To establish aiding and abetting, the government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt: First, that someone else committed the charged crime; and Second, that [defendant] consciously shared the other person's knowledge of the underlying criminal act, intended to help [him/her], and [willfully] took part in the endeavor, seeking to make it succeed. [Defendant] need not perform the underlying criminal act, be present when it is performed, or be aware of the details of its execution to be guilty of aiding and abetting. But a general suspicion that an unlawful act may occur or that something criminal is happening is not enough. Mere presence at the scene of a crime and knowledge that a crime is being committed are also not sufficient to establish aiding and abetting. [An act is done "willfully" if done voluntarily and intentionally with the intent that something the law forbids be done - that is to say with bad purpose, either to disobey or disregard the law.] Based on this, I would say a miner would not be guilty. They would have no more than a "general suspicion that an unlawful act may occur" at most, and that's not enough.