For other uses, see Crime (disambiguation).

"Criminal" redirects here. For other uses, see Criminal (disambiguation).

"Offender" redirects here. For the film, see Offender (film).
The examples and perspective in this article deal primarily with Europe and
the United States and do not represent aworldwide view of the
subject. Please improve this article or create a new one as appropriate, and
discuss the issue on thetalk page. (November 2013) (Learn how and when to remove this
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Justice and Divine Vengeance Pursuing Crime(Pierre-Paul

Prud'hon, oil-on-canvas, 1808).

Criminal law
Pierre-Paul Prud'hon - Justice and Divine Vengeance Pursuing
Crime.JPG

Elements

Actus reus

Mens rea

Causation

Concurrence
Scope of criminal liability

Complicity

Corporate

Vicarious
Severity of offense

Felony
Infraction (also called Violation)

Misdemeanor

Inchoate offenses

Attempt

Conspiracy

Incitement

Solicitation

Offence against the person

Assassination

Assault

Battery

Bigamy

Criminal negligence

False imprisonment

Home invasion

Homicide

Kidnapping

Manslaughter (corporate)

Mayhem

Murder

corporate

Negligent homicide

Public indecency

Rape
Robbery
Sexual assault

Vehicular homicide
Crimes against property

Blackmail

Bribery

Burglary

Embezzlement

Extortion

False pretenses

Arson

Fraud

Larceny

Payola
Pickpocketing
Possessing stolen property

Robbery

Smuggling

Tax evasion

Theft

Crimes against justice

Compounding

Malfeasance in office

Miscarriage of justice

Misprision

Obstruction

Perjury
Perverting the course of justice
Victimless crimes

Adultery

Apostasy

Blasphemy

Buggery

Providing Contraception information(Comstock law)

Dueling
Fornication

Gambling

Adult incest

Lewd and lasciviousbehavior

Masturbation

Creation ofObscenity

Prostitution

Recreational drug use (including alcohol,

when prohibited)

Sale of sex toys

Sodomy
Statutory rape

Suicide

Crimes against animals

Cruelty to animals

Wildlife smuggling

Bestiality
Defences to liability

Automatism

Consent

Defence of property

Diminished responsibility

Duress

Entrapment

Ignorantia juris non excusat

Infancy

Insanity

Justification

Mistake (of law)

Necessity

Provocation

Self-defence
Other common-law areas

Contracts

Evidence

Property

Torts

Wills, trusts and estates

Portals

Criminal justice

Law

Criminology
and penology

Theory[show]

Types of crime[hide]

Against humanity

Blue-collar

Corporate

Juvenile

Organized

Political

Public-order

State
State-corporate

Victimless

White-collar

War
Penology[show]
Schools[show]

In ordinary language, the term crime denotes an unlawful act punishable by a state.[1] The term
"crime" does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,
[2]

though statutory definitions have been provided for certain purposes.[3]The most popular view is

that crime is a category created by law; in other words, something is a crime if declared as such
by the relevant and applicable law.[2] One proposed definition is that a crime
or offence (or criminal offence) is an act harmful not only to some individual or individuals but
also to a community, society or the state ("a public wrong"). Such acts are forbidden and
punishable by law.[1][4]
The notion that acts such as murder, rape and theft are to be prohibited exists worldwide.[5] What
precisely is a criminal offence is defined by criminal law of each country. While many have a
catalogue of crimes called the criminal code, in some common lawcountries no such
comprehensive statute exists.
The state (government) has the power to severely restrict one's liberty for committing a crime.
In modern societies, there areprocedures to which investigations and trials must adhere. If
found guilty, an offender may be sentenced to a form of reparation such as a community
sentence, or, depending on the nature of their offence, to undergo imprisonment, life
imprisonment or, in somejurisdictions, execution.
Usually, to be classified as a crime, the "act of doing something criminal" (actus reus) must
with certain exceptions be accompanied by the "intention to do something criminal" (mens
rea).[4]

While every crime violates the law, not every violation of the law counts as a crime. Breaches
of private law (torts and breaches of contract) are not automatically punished by the state, but
can be enforced through civil procedure.
Contents
[hide]

1Overview

2Etymology

3Definition
o

3.1England and Wales

3.2Scotland

3.3Sociology

3.4Other definitions

4Criminalization

5Labelling theory

6Natural-law theory

7History

8Classification and categorisation

o

8.1Categorisation by type

8.2Categorisation by penalty

8.3Common law

8.4Classification by mode of trial

8.5Classification by origin

8.6Other classifications

8.7U.S. classification

9Offence in common law jurisdictions

10Causes and correlates of crime

11Crimes in international law

12Religion and crime

13Military jurisdictions and states of emergency

14Employee crime

15See also

16Notes

17References

18External links

Overview
When informal relationships and sanctions prove insufficient to establish and maintain a
desired social order, a government or astate may impose more formalized or stricter systems
of social control. With institutional and legal machinery at their disposal, agents of the State can
compel populations to conform to codes and can opt to punish or attempt to reform those who do
not conform.
Authorities employ various mechanisms to regulate (encouraging or discouraging) certain
behaviors in general. Governing or administering agencies may for example codify rules into
laws, police citizens and visitors to ensure that they comply with those laws, and implement other
policies and practices that legislators or administrators have prescribed with the aim of
discouraging orpreventing crime. In addition, authorities provide remedies and sanctions, and
collectively these constitute a criminal justice system. Legal sanctions vary widely in their
severity; they may include (for example) incarceration of temporary character aimed at reforming
the convict. Some jurisdictions have penal codes written to inflict permanent harsh punishments:
legal mutilation, capital punishmentor life without parole.
Usually a natural person perpetrates a crime, but legal persons may also commit crimes.
Conversely, at least under U.S. law, nonpersons such as animals cannot commit crimes. [6]
The sociologist Richard Quinney has written about the relationship between society and crime.
When Quinney states "crime is a social phenomenon" he envisages both how individuals
conceive crime and how populations perceive it, based on societal norms. [7]

Etymology
The word crime is derived from the Latin root cern, meaning "I decide, I give judgment".
Originally the Latin word crmen meant "charge" or "cry of distress."[8] The Ancient
Greek word krima (), from which the Latin cognate derives, typically referred to an
intellectual mistake or an offense against the community, rather than a private or moral wrong. [9]
In 13th century English crime meant "sinfulness", according to etymonline.com. It was probably
brought to England as Old Frenchcrimne (12th century form of Modern French crime), from

Latin crimen (in the genitive case: criminis). In Latin, crimen could have signified any one of the
following: "charge, indictment, accusation; crime, fault, offense".
The word may derive from the Latin cernere "to decide, to sift" (see crisis, mapped
on Kairos and Chronos). But Ernest Klein (citingKarl Brugmann) rejects this and suggests *crimen, which originally would have meant "cry of distress". Thomas G. Tucker suggests a root in
"cry" words and refers to English plaint, plaintiff, and so on. The meaning "offense punishable by
law" dates from the late 14th century. The Latin word is glossed in Old English by facen, also
"deceit, fraud, treachery", [cf. fake]. Crime wave is first attested in 1893 in American English.

Definition
England and Wales
Whether a given act or omission constitutes a crime does not depend on the nature of that act or
omission. It depends on the nature of the legal consequences that may follow it. [10] An act or
omission is a crime if it is capable of being followed by what are called criminal proceedings.[11][12]
History
The following definition of "crime" was provided by the Prevention of Crimes Act 1871, and
applied[13] for the purposes of section 10 of the Prevention of Crime Act 1908:
The expression "crime" means, in England and Ireland, any felony or the offence of uttering false
or counterfeit coin, or of possessing counterfeit gold or silver coin, or the offence of obtaining
goods or money by false pretences, or the offence of conspiracy to defraud, or
any misdemeanour under the fifty-eighth section of theLarceny Act, 1861.

Scotland