There should never be a strict liability element in a criminal law Essay

T here(predicate) should never be a unbending liability element in a criminal law offence. There should never be punishment without fault. C - Essay Example cruel liability is a stringent provision since the defendants are likely to be convicted even if they were truly unconscious(predicate) of cardinal or the multiple factors that labelled their acts as criminal offense. The defendants therefore, may not be unlawfulor guilty, in actual sense, i.e. absence of criminal negligence, the minimum blameworthy status withinmens rea. Thus, one may argue that strict liability in a true sense is an inappropriate give of the criminal law which, owing to the grave implications that it have on a wrongly convicted defendant, should be do permissible only for the regulating or governing serious crimes committed by the culpable miscreants. This name will critically examine various cases and analyse whether there should not be a strict liability element within a criminal law offence, and there should never be punishment without fault. Discussion What are strict liability laws and their applications Strict liability laws enacted in the 19th century aimed at elevating the working conditions and establishing standard safety norms within factories. The necessity to ascertain mens reas against the factory owners was not easy which culminated in very few prosecutions. The strict liability offences were created so as to tackle the factory owners more effectively and to ensure that the rate of convictions increased. In the modern context, common strict liability offences today include the driving force over the prescribed speed limit and selling of alcohol to underage persons. Although the contentious issue here pertains to the fact that a persons state of mind with which he/she acts should be made wise to his/her criminal liability (as opposed to the notions of how to deal with a defendant should he be proven guilty) it however, does not represent the law. This aspect is par ticularly relevant in the case of real crimes where defendants are generally not held as criminally liable, for their conduct, if they are innocent (Ashworth and Blake, 1997). In a large number of offences, however, a prosecuted may face convictions even though his behaviour was unintentional, was not aware, not reckless or negligent, as regards to a necessary element of the offence charged. In such cases, an individual is liable to face punishment though there may be a total lack or absence of any misplay on his part, as per the elements in question, which come under strict liability laws (Lemon, 1979). The debate These laws are relevant either inregulatory offencesthat administer social behaviour, where the stigma associated with the convicted person is minimal. The laws are also relevant in cases where the society is concerned with the harm prevention and reduction, and wants to obtain high deterrent values for a certain offense. However, a closer look at the various cases wil l reveal that are chances that some of the imposition of strict liability may function unjustly in certain isolated cases. As for example, if we study the case Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain v Storkwainwe will find that a pill pusher sold drugs to a patient who had produced a medical prescription that was a forged (Pharmaceutical Soc