Effecting A Public Mischief
The first signs of the modern distinction between criminal and civil proceedings were during the Norman conquest of England in 1066. The earliest criminal trials had very little, if any, settled law to apply. However, the civil delictual law was highly developed and consistent in its operation (except where the King wanted to raise money by selling a new form of Writ). A local lord of the manor (or family) could hold their servants and tenants responsible in a manorial court and was among wealthy people who could more easily enlist the help of a county or city bailiff, posse comitatus if one existed and the justices of the peace. The sheriff was the often-armed representative of the king in a city, town or shire, responsible for collecting taxes and enforcing his laws. The church could hold ecclesiastical courts to resolve offences in its canon law and on its narrow territorial jurisdiction. Justice for crimes sought in older forums and by private prosecution declined&mda ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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English Criminal Law
English criminal law concerns offences, their prevention and the consequences, in England and Wales. Criminal conduct is considered to be a wrong against the whole of a community, rather than just the private individuals affected. The state, in addition to certain international organisations, has responsibility for crime prevention, for bringing the culprits to justice, and for dealing with convicted offenders. The police, the criminal courts and prisons are all publicly funded services, though the main focus of criminal law concerns the role of the courts, how they apply criminal statutes and common law, and why some forms of behaviour are considered criminal. The fundamentals of a crime are a guilty act (or ''actus reus'') and a guilty mental state (or ''mens rea''). The traditional view is that moral culpability requires that a defendant should have recognised or intended that they were acting wrongly, although in modern regulation a large number of offences relating to road ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Treasury Solicitor
The Government Legal Department (previously called the Treasury Solicitor's Department) is the largest in-house legal organisation in the United Kingdom's Government Legal Service. The department is headed by the Treasury Solicitor. This office goes back several centuries. The office was enshrined in law by the Treasury Solicitor Act 1876, which established the Treasury Solicitor as a corporation sole (an office with perpetual succession). Employees of the department exercise legal powers which are vested in the corporation sole. The department is a non-ministerial government department and executive agency. The Treasury Solicitor reports to the Attorney General for England and Wales. The department employs more than 1,900 solicitors and barristers to provide advice and legal representation on a huge range of issues to many government departments. History The department was historically known as the Treasury Solicitor's Department, but changed name to the Government Legal Departme ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Concealment Of Treasure Trove
A treasure trove is an amount of money or coin, gold, silver, plate, or bullion found hidden underground or in places such as cellars or attics, where the treasure seems old enough for it to be presumed that the true owner is dead and the heirs undiscoverable. An archaeological find of treasure trove is known as a hoard. The legal definition of what constitutes treasure trove and its treatment under law vary considerably from country to country, and from era to era. The term is also often used metaphorically. Collections of articles published as a book are often titled ''Treasure Trove'', as in ''A Treasure Trove of Science''. This was especially fashionable for titles of children's books in the early- and mid-20th century. Terminology ''Treasure trove'', sometimes rendered ''treasure-trove'', literally means "treasure that has been found". The English term ''treasure trove'' was derived from ''tresor trové'', the Anglo-French equivalent of the Latin legal term ''thesaurus i ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Burglary
Burglary, also called breaking and entering and sometimes housebreaking, is the act of entering a building or other areas without permission, with the intention of committing a criminal offence. Usually that offence is theft, robbery or murder, but most jurisdictions include others within the ambit of burglary. To commit burglary is to ''burgle'', a term back-formed from the word ''burglar'', or to ''burglarize''. Etymology Sir Edward Coke (1552–1634) explains at the start of Chapter 14 in the third part of ''Institutes of the Lawes of England'' (pub. 1644), that the word ''Burglar'' ("''or the person that committeth burglary''"), is derived from the words ''burgh'' and ''laron'', meaning ''house-thieves''. A note indicates he relies on the ''Brooke's case'' for this definition. According to one textbook, the etymology originates from Anglo-Saxon or Old English, one of the Germanic languages. (Perhaps paraphrasing Sir Edward Coke:) "The word ''burglar'' comes from the two Ge ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Robbery
Robbery is the crime of taking or attempting to take anything of value by force, threat of force, or by use of fear. According to common law, robbery is defined as taking the property of another, with the intent to permanently deprive the person of that property, by means of force or fear; that is, it is a larceny or theft accomplished by an assault. Precise definitions of the offence may vary between jurisdictions. Robbery is differentiated from other forms of theft (such as burglary, shoplifting, pickpocketing, or car theft) by its inherently violent nature (a violent crime); whereas many lesser forms of theft are punished as misdemeanors, robbery is always a felony in jurisdictions that distinguish between the two. Under English law, most forms of theft are triable either way, whereas robbery is triable only on indictment. The word "rob" came via French from Late Latin words (e.g., ''deraubare'') of Germanic origin, from Common Germanic ''raub'' "theft". Among the types ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Theft Act 1968
The Theft Act 1968c 60 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It creates a number of offences against property in England and Wales. On 15 January 2007 the Fraud Act 2006 came into force, redefining most of the offences of deception. History The Theft Act 1968 resulted from the efforts of the Criminal Law Revision Committee to reform the English law of theft. The Larceny Act 1916 had codified the common law, including larceny itself, but it remained a complex web of offences. The intention of the Theft Act 1968, was to replace the existing law of larceny and other deception-related offences, by a single enactment, creating a more coherent body of principles that would allow the law to evolve to meet new situations. Provisions A number of greatly simplifiedor at least less complicatedoffences were created. Section 1 – Basic definition of "theft" This section creates the offence of theft. This definition is supplemented by sections 2 to 6. The definition of theft ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Larceny
Larceny is a crime involving the unlawful taking or theft of the personal property of another person or business. It was an offence under the common law of England and became an offence in jurisdictions which incorporated the common law of England into their own law (also statutory law), where in many cases it remains in force. The crime of larceny has been abolished in England, Wales, Ireland, and Northern Ireland, broken up into the specific crimes of burglary, robbery, fraud, theft, and related crimes. However, larceny remains an offence in parts of the United States, Jersey, and in New South Wales, Australia, involving the taking (caption) and carrying away (asportation) of personal property without the owner's consent. Etymology The word "larceny" is a late Middle English word, from the Anglo-Norman word ''larcin'', "theft". Its probable Latin root is ''latrocinium'', a derivative of ''latro'', "robber" (originally mercenary). By nation Australia New South Wales In the st ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Criminal Damage Act 1971
Criminal damage in English law was originally a common law offence. The offence was largely concerned with the protection of dwellings and the food supply, and few sanctions were imposed for damaging personal property. Liability was originally restricted to the payment of damages by way of compensation. As time passed, specific laws were introduced to deal with particular situations as they were judged to require intervention, most particularly alongside the rise of mechanisation and urbanisation during the Industrial Revolution. The modern law of criminal damage is mostly contained in the Criminal Damage Act 1971, which redefines or creates several offences protecting property rights. The Act provides a comprehensive structure covering merely preparatory acts to the most serious offences of arson and causing damage with intent to endanger life. As such, punishments vary from a fixed penalty to life imprisonment, and the court may order payment of compensation to a victim. H ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Arson
Arson is the crime of willfully and deliberately setting fire to or charring property. Although the act of arson typically involves buildings, the term can also refer to the intentional burning of other things, such as motor vehicles, watercraft, or forests. The crime is typically classified as a felony, with instances involving a greater degree of risk to human life or property carrying a stricter penalty. Arson which results in death can be further prosecuted as manslaughter or murder. A common motive for arson is to commit insurance fraud. In such cases, a person destroys their own property by burning it and then lies about the cause in order to collect against their insurance policy. A person who commits arson is referred to as an arsonist, or a serial arsonist if arson has been committed several times. Arsonists normally use an accelerant (such as gasoline or kerosene) to ignite, propel and directionalize fires, and the detection and identification of ignitable liqui ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Offences Against The Person Act 1828
The Offences Against the Person Act 1828 (9 Geo. 4 c. 31) (also known as Lord Lansdowne's Act) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. It consolidated provisions in the law related to offences against the person (an expression which, in particular, includes offences of violence) from a number of earlier statutes into a single Act. It was part of the criminal law reforms known collectively as " Peel's Acts", passed with the objective of simplifying the law. Among the laws it replaced was clause XXVI of ''Magna Carta'', the first time any part of ''Magna Carta'' was repealed, and the Buggery Act 1533. It also abolished the crime of petty treason. The Act only applied to England and Wales (then described as England). A similar statute was passed for Ireland the following year (10 Geo. 4 c. 34). A number of the Act's provisions were repealed and replaced by the Offences against the Person Act 1837. The death penalty for shooting, stabbing ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Petty Treason
Petty treason or petit treason was an offence under the common law of England in which a person killed or otherwise violated the authority of a social superior, other than the king. In England and Wales, petty treason ceased to be a distinct offence from murder by virtue of the Offences against the Person Act 1828. It was abolished in Ireland in 1829. It never existed in Scotland. It has also been abolished in other common-law countries. Element of betrayal The element of betrayal is the reason why this crime was considered worse than an ordinary murder; medieval and post-medieval society rested on a framework in which each person had his or her appointed place and such murders were seen as threatening this framework. Many people had somebody subordinate to them and feared the consequences if the murder of superiors was not punished harshly. Codification in English law The common law offence was codified in the Treason Act 1351. Under that Act, petty treason was an aggravated for ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Prosecution Of Offences Act 1985
The Prosecution of Offences Act 1985 (c. 23) was an Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom. Its main effects were to establish the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), to transfer the responsibility of prosecution of offences from the police to the CPS, and to codify the prosecution process. References External linksText of the Act as in force today(including any amendments) within the United Kingdom, from legislation.gov.uk legislation.gov.uk, formerly known as the UK Statute Law Database, is the official web-accessible database of the statute law of the United Kingdom, hosted by The National Archives. It contains all primary legislation in force since 1267 and a .... United Kingdom Acts of Parliament 1985 Acts of the Parliament of the United Kingdom concerning England and Wales {{UK-statute-stub ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |