Chapter 14

1. Chapter 14 Criminal Responsibility and Defenses

2. Defenses in General • Negative Defense – any criminal defense not required to be specifically pled. • Burden of Production of Evidence – the obligation of a party to produce some evidence is support of a proposition asserted. • Preponderance of Evidence – evidence that has greater weight than countervailing evidence.

3. Defenses in General Continued: • Affirmative Defense – defendant bears the burden of proof. (Ex. Automatism, intoxication, coercion, and duress). • Burden to Prove – prove by the preponderance of the evidence that defendant acted out of necessity.

4. Defenses Asserting Lack of Capacity to Commit a Crime Four defenses assert lack of capacity to commit a crime: 1. Infancy • Common law regarded a child under 7 incapable of forming criminal intent. • Parens Patriae – role of state as guardian of minors 2. Intoxication • Ingestion of alcohol or drugs • Voluntary intoxication – becoming drunk or intoxicated on one’s own free will. • Involuntary intoxication – not the result of intentional ingestion of an intoxicating substance.

5. Defenses Asserting Lack of Capacity to Commit a Crime Continued: 3. Insanity • All people are presumed sane unless previously adjudicated insane. • M’Naghten Rule – must prove the defendant was suffering from disease of the mind or did not know what he was doing was wrong. • Irresistible Impulse – desire that can’t be resisted due to impairment of the will by mental disease. • Durham Test – person not criminally responsible if it was a product of mental disease or defect.

6. Defenses Asserting Lack of Capacity to Commit a Crime Continued: • ALI Standard or Substantial Capacity Test – person lacks substantial capacity to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirements of the law. • Insanity Defense Reform Act of 1984 – insanity is an affirmative defense to a prosecution under a federal statute and details the requirements for establishing such a defense. • Clear and convincing evidence standard – higher than the standard of preponderance of evidence and lower than the standard of beyond a reasonable doubt. • Beyond a Reasonable Doubt – required to be introduced before a defendant can be found guilty of a crime or before a juvenile can be adjudicated a delinquent.

7. Defenses Asserting Lack of Capacity to Commit a Crime Continued: • Guilty but Mentally Ill – jury finds that the defendant’s mental illness does not deprive the defendant of substantial capacity sufficient to satisfy the insanity test but warrants treatment in addition to incarceration. 4. Automatism • Condition under which a person performs a set of actions during a state of unconsciousness.

8. Defenses Asserting Excuse or Justification • Duress – use of illegal confinement or threats of harm to coerce someone to do something he would not otherwise do. • Battered Woman Syndrome – group of symptoms typically manifested by a woman who has suffered continued physical or mental abuse, usually from a male she lives with. • Necessity – condition that requires a certain course of action. • Consent – voluntarily yielding to the will or desire of another person. • Mistake of Law – an erroneous opinion of legal principles applied to a set of facts. • Mistake of Fact – unconscious ignorance of a fact or belief in the existence of something that does not exist. • Alibi – person claiming to be elsewhere when crime happened.

9. Defenses Justifying the Use of Force Justifiable use of force – necessary and reasonable use of force by someone in self-defense, defense of another, or defense of property. Deadly force – force likely to cause death or serious bodily injury. • Be in a place where he has a right to be • Act without fault • Act in reasonable fear of death or great bodily harm Nondeadly force – force that does not cause death.

10. Defenses Justifying the Use of Force Continued: • Self-Defense – protecting yourself from an attack. • Person who can safely retreat must do so before using deadly force. • Retreat Rule – person does not have to retreat in his own dwelling. • Defense of Others • Reasonable force – necessary to defend anyone from harm.

11. Defenses Based on Constitutional and Statutory Authority • Constitutional Immunity • The privilege against self-incrimination guaranteed by the federal Constitution is a personal one that applies only to natural people, not corporations. • Use Immunity – testimony given cannot be used against the witness. • Transactional Immunity – protects witness from prosecution for any activity mentioned in the witness’s testimony. • Contractual Immunity – makes a witness immune from prosecution in exchange for the witness’s testimony. • Diplomatic Immunity – to be free from arrest and prosecution granted under international law to diplomats, their staff and household members.

12. Defenses Based on Constitutional and Statutory Authority Continued: • Double Jeopardy – can’t be tried twice for the same crime. • Jeopardy attaches once the jury is sworn in. • If a defendant appeals from a conviction and prevails, it is not double jeopardy for prosecution to retry the defendant, unless there is insufficient evidence – evidence that does not legally establish offense or defense.

13. Defenses Based on Constitutional and Statutory Authority Continued: • Statutes of Limitation – legislative enactment that places a time limit on the prosecution of a crime. • Tolling – cessation of the statute of limitations.

14. Defenses Based on Improper Government Conduct • Entrapment – government agents inducing someone to commit a crime that person would not normally do. • Objective test of entrapment – court inquires whether police methods were so improper to induce or ensnare a reasonable person into committing a crime. • Subjective test of entrapment – whether defendant’s criminal intent originated in the mind of the police officer or the defendant was predisposed to commit the offense.

15. Nontraditional Defenses • Religious Beliefs and Practices • Victim’s Negligence • Premenstrual Syndrome • Compulsive Gambling • Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome • The “Junk Food” Defense • Television Intoxication • Pornographic Intoxication