U.S. Supreme Court
May 7, 2014
Supreme Court struggles with nuances of mens rea
"Even a dog," Justice Holmes famously wrote, "distinguishes between being stumbled over and being kicked." By Rory K. Little
Rory K. Little
Joseph W. Cotchett Jr. Professor of Law
UC Hastings College of the Law
Email: littler@uchastings.edu
Rory clerked at the U.S. Supreme Court and also served as an associate deputy attorney general in 1996-97
"Even a dog," Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes famously wrote, "distinguishes between being stumbled over and being kicked." That is, we generally desire to visit harsh criminal consequences on intentional bad actors, and not on the reasonable or accidentally negligent. Issues of mens rea - what constitutes a "guilty mind" and how to define with precision the states of mind that ought to result in criminal conviction -...
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