Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure: Elements, Defences, and Stage Traps
General part of criminal law
The candidate must master the structure of a criminal offence: the statutory elements (actus reus), unlawfulness, guilt (capacity and intent or negligence), and the absence of justification or excuse. Learn the defences: self-defence, necessity, coercion, mistake of fact versus mistake of law, and diminished capacity. Understand attempt, complicity, instigation and aiding, and the rules on concurrence of offences and cumulative sentencing.
Procedure
Criminal procedure tests the stages: investigation, indictment, main hearing, judgment, and remedies. Know the roles of the public prosecutor, the investigating judge, the defence counsel, and the injured party. Understand coercive measures (detention, search, seizure) and the conditions and duration limits for each. Know the grounds for nullity of a judgment and the difference between an appeal on facts and one on law.
Traps
Questions frequently test mistake of law (generally not exculpatory unless unavoidable) versus mistake of fact (negates intent). Another trap is the difference between necessity as justification and excessive necessity. In procedure, watch for the distinction between a procedural defect raised in time and one waived by silence, and the rule that illegally obtained evidence may be excluded.
Rule of thumb
Analyse every offence in the same order: statutory elements, unlawfulness, guilt, then sentencing. For procedural questions, ask which stage the act belongs to and whether the deadline has passed.
Worked example
D, believing a locked room is empty, breaks in to steal; a person is inside. D lacks intent to endanger persons. D is liable for attempted theft plus a negligence-based offence only if the statute criminalises that negligence. The mistake of fact negates the intentional element, not the act itself.