The corpus delicti of a crime
A crime is understood as a socially dangerous act directed against the social and state system, the system of economy, property and other rights of citizens.
Criminal legislation states that there can be no criminal responsibility where the nature of the act is not socially dangerous.
Each crime consists of a number of individual elements. Those elements characterize the purpose of a criminal act, the form and method of a criminal act, the character of a criminal act and so forth. The total sum of such elements defining a specific crime comprises the corpus delicti of a crime. The corpus delicti in any act is grounds for establishing criminal responsibility against the offender. A person may not be considered guilty of having committed a crime, unless most of elements of corpus delicti of that crime have been established in his acts. In passing its sentence the court must answer these questions: a) did the act actually take place? b) does it contain corpus delicti? c) was the act performed by the accused?
The object of a crime is social relations guarded by criminal legislation. Each crime has an immediate object. Thus, murder has its immediate object – human life, theft – state, collective or personal property, hooliganism – public law and order and so on.
A crime may be committed by an act or by the non-performance of acts which it was his duty to perform (such as failure to use authority or failure to give assistance to a person).
The subject of a crime is a person who commits the crime and is responsible for it. Only persons who have attained a certain age and are compos mentis can be the subject of a crime. The age of 14 is considered to be criminally responsible. Actually, the age limit for some crimes (in official capacity, military crimes) is higher.
A person who, at the time of the commission of a crime, is non-compos mentis, isn’t criminally responsible. There may be chronic mental disease, temporary mental derangement, weak-mindedness or some other. A person committing a crime while in a state of drunkenness is not relieved of criminal responsibility.
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