8/6/2020 What does "Nulla Poena Sine Lege" Mean?

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Category: Law
What does "Nulla Poena Sine
Lege" Mean?
JESSICA ELLIS
Last Modi ed Date: July 16, 2020

Nulla poena sine lege is a Latin phrase that means “no penalty
without law.” This legal concept, which has long been a fundamental
idea of written law, forbids the penalization of actions that are not
governed by a statute or law. Nulla poena sine lege, though it seems
rather straightforward, sometimes causes controversy in the matter
of jurisdiction.

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Nulla poena sine lege is a Latin phrase that means “no penalty without law.”.
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The concept of nulla poena sine lege is closely related to several
similar concepts. Usually, it works in conjunction with the idea that
Learn something new every day. there is no crime without a law, or nulla crimen sine lege, to protect
people from being convicted and punished when there are no laws
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against their actions. It is also frequently mentioned alongside
another Latin phrase, nulla poena sine praevia lege poenali, which
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means that a new law cannot be used retroactively to punish people.
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This last term is quite important to the practice of nulla poena sine
lege, as it can prevent legal systems from creating laws to punish
past behavior. If, for instance, a city noticed a pattern of gra ti
tagging, but had no law against it, nulla poena sine lege would
suggest that taggers could not be punished until after a law is made
that makes the action an o ense. What nulla poena sine praevia lege
poenali guarantees, in this instance, is that no person could be tried
or convicted for tagging before the law came into e ect. Since the
action was not illegal at the time, it is generally considered a
miscarriage of justice to assign penalties following a new criminal
statute.

Nulla poena sine lege comes into some contention on the matter of
international law and jurisdiction. The Nuremberg Trials are
frequently mentioned as a primary source of controversy on this
matter, since many of the crimes Nazi leaders were charged with did
not exist in law until after World War II. Moreover, since the actions
of the Nazis were expressly in order with German law, some critics
question whether the international tribunal had any right to
supersede the sovereignty of Germany. Since the crime of genocide
did not truly exist, nor had any statuary penalties been assigned to
such a crime, a strict interpretation of nulla poena sine lege might
suggest the Nuremberg trials were unlawful.

One of the most important e ects of nulla poena sine lege is that it
places a check on judicial power. By limiting punishments to those
proscribed by statutes, the potential to assign extreme punishments
is held at bay to some degree. Judicial activists sometimes argue that
these strictures are too rigorous and may prevent judges from fairly
considering each case on an individual basis. Nevertheless, nulla
poena sine lege remains an in uential and critical part of many legal
systems in the modern world.

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