1. Check list
  2. Major issue
  3. Component checklist
  4. State issue, tell the rule -- and the public policy basis for the rule
  5. Jurisdiction
  6. When the state is the legal cite -- conduct or example
  7. As to crimes of omission, the jurisdiction applies to where the act should have been performed
  8. Elements of a crime
  9. Act
  10. Any bodily movement
  11. Exceptions
  12. Act which is not the product of the actor's own volition
  13. Someone pushes someone into a third person
  14. Reflexive or convulsive act, like having an epileptic seizure
  15. Act performed while one is unconscious or asleep
  16. Sleep walking
  17. Omissions
  18. Statute (tax returns)
  19. Contract (lifeguard, nurse)
  20. Relationship between the parties (parents, spouses)
  21. Voluntarily assuming a duty of care towards someone else, than failing to perform
  22. Where your conduct created the peril
  23. Mental state
  24. Transferred intent -- intent gets transferred from one's attempt to their right -- makes one crime into two
  25. Murder
  26. Attempt at what failed
  27. Common law -- want to know which crimes go with which crimes under the common law
  28. Specific intent -- the state must prove the intent by independent evidence (and cannot be inferred from the conduct) Qualify for additional defenses not available for other kinds of crimes. Voluntary intoxication is a defense
  29. Inchoate crimes
  30. Solicitation: Asking someone to commit a crime
  31. Conspiracy: If one asks someone to commit a crime, and they agree (only crime is conspiracy)
  32. Attempt
  33. First Degree Murder (created by statute)
  34. If you see "murder" -- it is murder in the 2nd degree, and is not a specific intent crimes
  35. A defense would reduce the first degree crime to a malice crime of murder -- which is murder in the 2nd degree
  36. Assault (*)
  37. All common law felonies against property
  38. Larceny
  39. embezzlement
  40. robbery
  41. burglary
  42. forgery
  43. false pretences
  44. Malice (two malice crimes at common law ( Murder, and Arson))
  45. Common law murder
  46. General Intent (rape and battery and more) -- all other crimes unless they qualify for strict liability -- intent can be inferred from conduct
  47. All other crimes are general intent
  48. Strict Liability
  49. If the crime is in the administrative, regulatory, or morality area (if there are no adverbs) -- problem with assumption of strict liability according to the
  50. Mistake of fact negates intention -- so it can't be a defense to strict liability
  51. If a statute is administrative, regulatory, or morality area
  52. Any defense that negates an intention is no defense to the no intent crimes of strict liability
  53. Formula for strict liability
  54. Any defense to
  55. Model Penal Code -- know what the four intents are, and how they correspond to the common law
  56. Purposely
  57. one wants the end results to happen (no matter how unlikely)
  58. Common Law: specific intent
  59. Knowingly
  60. didn’t' need to want the result, but engaged in conduct overwhelmingly likely to produce that result
  61. Common Law: specific intent
  62. Recklessly
  63. Engage in conduct where there is a great risk of harm
  64. Knew there was a great risk of harm, and disregarded it
  65. Criminal Negligence (do note equate to
  66. Like civil negligence, only at a higher standard
  67. Accomplice Liability
  68. Accomplices are liable for the crime itself and all other foreseeable crimes
  69. Do not give anyone accomplice liability the person does not actively aiding abetting or counseling the crime
  70. Don't give people accomplice liability just because they are present, but they seem to be consenting
  71. They need to be liable for the crime itself and all other foreseeable crimes
  72. Conspiracy (see top) If one asks someone to commit a crime, and they agree (only crime is conspiracy)
  73. elements of conspiracy
  74. An agreement
  75. Intent to agree
  76. Intent to pursue the unlawful objective
  77. Liability for conspiracy: each conspirator is liable for all the crimes of co-conspirators if those crimes were committed in furtherance of the conspiracy and were foreseeable
  78. Agreement necessary for conspiracy -- but the agreement does not have to be express
  79. Defenses to conspiracy
  80. Overt act
  81. Majority: Agreement and some overt act
  82. Any act will do
  83. Guy shows up at place he agrees to rob
  84. Second meeting
  85. Minority: -- and common law -- conspiracy is in agreement itself
  86. Impossibility is no defense to conspiracy
  87. Withdrawals from conspiracy
  88. Even if withdrawal is adequate, can never withdraw the defendant from liability from the conspiracy itself
  89. Can withdraw from liability from other subsequent crimes
  90. Withdraw, even if adequate can never withdraw from liability from the conspirators other subsequent crimes
  91. Attempt (see top)
  92. Attempt is specific intent, and a substantial step in the direction of the crime
  93. Mere preparation for crime cannot be enough, must be a step beyond mere preparation
  94. Impossibility is no defense to a charge of attempt
  95. Majority/MPC:
  96. If the facts could have been as the defendant believed them, and if that would be a crime, then he would be guilty of attempting the crime under the MPC and under the majority position.
  97. Defenses
  98. Insanity -- four test
  99. M'Naughton Rule (traditional): Defendant is not guilty by reason of insanity if he lacked the ability to know (and the time of his conduct) the wrongfulness of his action or to understand the nature and quality of his action
  100. I.e. one thinks that they are squeezing lemons
  101. Irresistible impulse: Defendant lacked the ability or capacity for self control and free choice.
  102. Durham rule (formerly test in DC and NH): Defendant's conduct is a product of a mental illness
  103. ALI or MPC test: Defendant lacked the ability to conform his conduct to the requirements of law
  104. Intoxication
  105. Voluntary intoxication: Addicts and alcoholics are voluntarily intoxicated
  106. Voluntary intoxication is a defense only to specific intent crimes
  107. Involuntary intoxication: When someone is slipped into one's drink or forced to drink)
  108. This is a form of insanity
  109. Just like insanity it is a defense to all crimes, even the no intent crimes of strict liability
  110. Infancy
  111. Under seven -- no criminal liability
  112. Under fourteen -- rebuttable presumption of criminal liability
  113. Self defense
  114. Non-deadly force: one may use non-deadly force any time they believe that a victim reasonably believes that force is about to be used on him
  115. Deadly force
  116. Majority: A victim may use deadly force any time that victim reasonably believes that deadly force is about to be used on him
  117. Deadly force is any force that results in death
  118. Minority: Require a victim to retreat to the wall if it safe to do so
  119. Exceptions to duty to retreat
  120. Don't have to retreat out of your home
  121. Don't have to retreat if you are a victim of a rape or robbery
  122. Police officers have no duty to retreat
  123. When does an original aggressor get the defense of self-defense unless the aggressor runs away and stops at the door, communicate that he is withdrawing.
  124. Defense of others: This turns on only the reasonableness of the belief that they need your assistance.
  125. Defense of a dwelling
  126. Deadly force may never be sued solely to defend your property
  127. Spring guns are a crime -- deadly force may never be used solely to defend your property
  128. Duress and Necessity
  129. Defenses to all crimes at common law, except homicide
  130. Necessity is the same as duress, except that it is a defense to all crimes, except homicide
  131. Mistake of fact (defense only when it negates intention) -- must be reasonable.
  132. Any mistake, no matter how preposterous is an event, if the defendant is charged with a specific intent crime

Mistake of fact chart
Mental State of the Crime / Application of the Defense
Specific Intent / Any mistake (reasonable or unreasonable)
Malice and General Intent / Reasonable Mistakes only
Strict Liability / Never
  1. Mistake of law
  2. No excuse but see caveat
  1. Consent of the victim
  2. Entrapment
  3. Almost never available because predisposition on the part of the defendant to commit the crime negates entrapment
  1. Common law crimes -- no state actually has them. One you know the old common law crimes, one can predict the MPC versions
  2. Battery -- (General Intent) a completed assault
  3. Assault -- to tie to a mental state, it is necessary --must look at the statute
  4. Assault as an attempted battery (specific intent crime)
  5. Like all attempts, assault as an attempted battery is a specific intent crime
  6. Assault as a threat -- (general intent crime)
  7. Homicide
  8. Victim must be human
  9. Murder, by itself is common law murder (requiring malice) and won't be able to use the
  10. additional defenses for first degree murder (and for only specific intent crimes) -- lower the mental state to common law murder
  11. voluntary intoxication
  12. any mistake of fact reasonable or unreasonable
  13. MALICE at common law, one of the following intents were necessary (look like specific intent)
  14. Intent to kill
  15. Intent to do serious bodily harm
  16. Abandoned and malignant murder (highly reckless, depraved heart)
  17. Intentional performance of an act detailing a substantial likelihood of an act causing death
  18. I.e. play Russian Roulette
  19. Felony Murder: causing death while you are committing a felony
  20. Manslaughter -- Two kinds of manslaughter
  21. Voluntary manslaughter -- never use voluntary manslaughter unless there is some passion
  22. Killing from passion (provoked) -- no adequate time to cool off
  23. Fight
  24. involuntary manslaughter -- killings from criminal negligence
  25. falling asleep at the wheel of a car
  26. misdemeanor manslaughter
  27. killing while you are committing a misdemeanor
  28. or what is known as an unenunerated felony(not dangerous)
  29. felony murder
  30. if there is a defense to the underlying murder there is a defense to felony murder
  31. felony in question must be something other than the felony
  32. deaths must be foreseeable
  33. deaths caused while fleeing from a felony are felony murder
  34. once the defendant reaches a point of temporary safety, deaths caused after this are not felony murder
  35. REDLINE view: defendant is not liable for the death of a cofelon as a result of resistance by the victim or the police
  36. If the victim accidentally kills another, it is a felony murder
  37. Kidnapping
  38. Need a kid
  39. Need a napping
  40. Sex offences
  41. Rape -- slightest penetration completes the crime of rape
  42. Statutory rape (strict liability)
  43. Crimes against nature
  44. Bestiality
  45. Carnal knowledge
  46. Fornication
  47. Property offences
  48. Larceny
  49. Always requires an unlawful taking
  50. Common law larceny required a carrying away (asportation) without his consent with the intent to deprive the owner permanently of his interest in the property
  51. Continuing trespass (statutory expansions of Larceny)
  52. Not returning something accidentally taken
  53. Larceny by trick (statutory expansions of Larceny)
  54. I.e. changing price tags
  55. defendant gets possession not title
  56. Embezzlement -- embezzlement has lawful possession
  57. lawful possession followed by illegal conversion
  58. example is trustee
  59. defendant gets possession not title
  60. false pretences
  61. defendant convinces the owner of property to convey title via false pretenses
  62. must be a misrepresentation as to a present or future fact
  63. Robbery = Larceny + Assault
  64. Larceny
  65. Always requires an unlawful taking
  66. Common law larceny required a carrying away (asportation) without his consent with the intent to deprive the owner permanently of his interest in the property
  67. In order to be robbery the defendant must take from the person or his presence
  68. Take with any amount of violence
  69. Picking a pocket is larceny
  70. Putting in fear is robbery -- must be in immediate fear
  71. Can be immediate harm to someone else
  72. Extortion -- Robbery not in immediate fear
  73. Extortion is blackmail
  74. Differences between extortion and robbery
  75. One does not need to take anything from the person or his presence
  76. Threat of future harm
  77. Offences against habitation
  78. Burglary -- for common law had to be a dwelling house at night for intent to commit a felony
  79. Requires a breaking
  80. Could be constructive breaking
  81. Threats or fraud
  82. At common law any entry without breaking was not Burglary
  83. Entering
  84. Whenever any part of the defendant's body crosses into the house
  85. Intent to commit the felony must be present at the time of the burglary
  86. Arson
  87. At common law, arson had to be the dwelling house of another