Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Rochin v. California, 342 U.S. 165 (1952), was a case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States that added behavior that "shocks the conscience" into tests of what violates due process clause of the 14th Amendment. [1]
The Supreme Court has not explicitly decided whether a defendant's pre-arrest silence may be introduced as substantive evidence of guilt (i.e., may be used in the government's case-in-chief, even if the defendant chooses not to testify). A three-justice plurality of the Court, in Salinas v.
Other commentators have echoed the principle. Benjamin Franklin stated it as: "it is better 100 guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer". [5] Defending British soldiers charged with murder for their role in the Boston Massacre, John Adams also expanded upon the rationale behind Blackstone's Ratio when he stated:
"Guilt" is the obligation of a person who has violated a moral standard to bear the sanctions imposed by that moral standard. In legal terms, guilt means having been found to have violated a criminal law, [1] though the law also raises 'the issue of defences, pleas, the mitigation of offences, and the defeasibility of claims'. [4]
In United States law, an Alford plea, also called a Kennedy plea in West Virginia, [1] an Alford guilty plea, [2] [3] [4] and the Alford doctrine, [5] [6] [7] is a guilty plea in criminal court, [8] [9] [10] whereby a defendant in a criminal case does not admit to the criminal act and asserts innocence, but accepts imposition of a sentence.
It has been noted that the word, culpability, "ordinarily has normative force, for in nonlegal English, a person is culpable only if he is justly to blame for his conduct". [1] The guilt principle requires that in order to convict a person it is necessary to ascertain his voluntary or reckless behaviour, Strict Liability being prohibited.
The case of Hill v Baxter concerns the issue of automatism in driving in England and Wales without a diagnosed condition. It sets out guidelines as to when the defence will apply, and when it will not and what jury instructions ("directions to the jury" or considerations by the magistrates) should be given to leave the defence open for them to find or deny, given appropriate medical evidence ...
But the most interesting aspect is commentary by the Court regarding presumption of innocence: The principle that there is a presumption of innocence in favor of the accused is the undoubted law, axiomatic and elementary, and its enforcement lies at the foundation of the administration of our criminal law ...