Criminal Intent
idea · 2 works · 2 mentions · 3 anchored passages
criminal intent · criminal intention · criminal motive · dolus malus · guilt
spoken of as
1 expressionDolus malus“criminal intent”1 mention
Institutes of Roman Law (English)
Robbery, like theft, requires dolus malus, that is, criminal intention.
in the texts
Institutes of Roman Law
Requirement of fraudulent or unlawful intent as a necessary element of theft, robbery, and Aquilian liability.
Robbery, like theft, requires dolus malus, that is, criminal intention.
and the distinction is just, for there is no theft without unlawful intention.
and most jurists agree that as theft depends on intention, one below the age of puberty is not able to be charged with it unless, being near to that age, he understands that he is committing a delict.
An Essay on the Trial by Jury
The mental element of knowingly doing wrong, treated as necessary for criminal guilt
And it is a perfectly clear principle, although one which judges have in a great measure overthrown in practice, that jurors are to judge of the moral intent of an accused person, and hold him guiltless, whatever his act, unless they find him to have acted with a criminal intent;
This necessity for a criminal intent—in other words, for guilt—as a preliminary to conviction, makes it impossible that a man can be rightfully convicted for an act that is intrinsically innocent, though forbidden by the government;
There is no moral justice in, nor any political necessity for, punishing a man for any act whatever that he may have committed, if he have done it without any criminal intent.