Essence of the Distinction between Criminal and Civil Law - Assignment Example

Criminal and Civil Law Criminal and Civil Law A majority of people are well aware about criminal law due to extensive media coverage circulating renowned cases, but very few people are less understanding about civil law, otherwise known as tort law (Kadish, 2012). Normally, not unless someone is a lawyer or individual concerned in the court case, the distinction between the two types of laws can be insensitive. Nevertheless, there are differences between the two comprising of the type of offense, who files the complaint, punishments, as well as the burden of proof (Kadish, 2012). In essence, criminal law is for breaches of statutory crime and penalty and civil law, on the other hand, copes with non-criminal disputes. Criminal law clearly includes illegal behaviour, and civil law, on the other hand, includes disputes when no law has been violated. Instances of criminal cases comprise of murder, robbery, assault crimes or battery (Kadish, 2012). Civil cases normally include disagreements between tenants and property owners, divorces, real property issues, contract disagreements, as well as intellectual property disagreements. In criminal matters, the government, at all times, files the lawsuit or litigation. However, the plaintiff, in civil cases, files the lawsuit and typically is a private party such as a corporation or person (Kadish, 2012). Some lawmakers and attorneys consider that the idea of punishment is the main significance between these two types of law (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). The penalty for a criminal offense is extremely diverse since the defendant can be penalised by fines, imprisonment or even execution. In the U.S., for instance, statutory offenses are split into two main groups: felonies and misdemeanours (Kadish, 2012). Misdemeanours normally have an utmost sentence of a one-year imprisonment and felonies, on the other hand, normally have a least period of a one-year imprisonment (Kadish, 2012). In civil offenses, the "loser" normally has to repay the other party for financial losses or any other damages. There can be disciplinary damages rewarded in civil cases, as well, that comprise of making the defendant a case to deter alike, future behaviour (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). These kinds of damages are likely when the defendant has been demonstrated to have gross negligence, spiteful intent or a stubborn disrespect of the plaintiff’s rights. Also, the burden of proof is greatly different between criminal and civil law. The burden of proof, in civil law, is, at first, on the plaintiff, but, at times, can transfer to the defendant. If the jury or judge also considers that the proof favours the plaintiff (more than 50% probability), then the plaintiff triumphs in the case (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). This is different in criminal law, where the judges or juries need to be certain (fundamentally 98 or 99% certain) that the defendants are blameworthy. In such matters, the burden of proof rests exclusively on the prosecutor and never, at any time, switches to the defendant. On to the thesis, this paper will discuss the essence of the distinction between criminal and civil law and will illustrate the answer by referring to contemporary legal issues and actual cases where appropriate. It will also talk about the extent to which the two systems overlap and offer to a victim of a civil wrong and a crime. Essence of the Distinction between Criminal and Civil Law Criminal law was created to put sanctions on citizens whose behaviour is regarded intolerable enough to agitate punishment by the state (Kadish, 2012). This type of law has developed out of both common law and out of laws passed by the government. In England, it is mostly a field of law managed by the states, even though there is a rising number of criminal law being managed by the overall Commonwealth government like the 2005 Anti-Terrorism Act (Kadish, 2012). Criminal law not just defines what leads to a crime and covers the suitable sentences and penalties for diverse crimes, but also includes issues of court procedure like evidence. Even though, the main crimes acts seem to incorporate most crimes, other laws can inflict criminal penalties. The main split in criminal law is between summary offences (formerly referred to as misdemeanours) and indictable offences (formerly referred to as felonies) (Kadish, 2012). In the past, a felony was punished with death, and a misdemeanour, on the other hand, was not punished with death, thus this split developed as a very significant difference for defendants. Initially, in England, an indictable offence (felony) was heard in front of a grand jury (23 men) and its task was to settle whether the indicted person had a case to answer in court (Kadish, 2012). If this was settled upon, then the case would be forwarded to a petty jury (12 men) for trial. It is fairly tough to appeal the jury’s decision in criminal law because the guess is that once the 12-man jury has decided a ruling, it will not be straightforward for the accused to dispute that verdict (Kadish, 2012). Civil law, in contrast, was created to resolves all other disputes apart from the ones stated for criminal law. Civil law, for instance, contract disputes, covers accidents or the splitting up of a will. In essence, civil law copes with private disagreements between private organisations or people. According to Kadish (2012), numerous civil law cases concern what are referred to as torts, which are lawful offenses. The phrase tort is adapted from the Latin name tortus, which means a wrong. Tort laws were created to protect a person’s bodily security and safety, intellectual property and tangible property and a person’s reputation and status (Kadish, 2012). If any of these matters are damaged or compromised by another individual or corporation, an intervention can be sought by an act for compensation that normally takes the form of financial damages (Kadish, 2012). A sum of money is brought in to pay off the damage and loss endured by the casualty of the offense, and to reinstate the injured individual to the status he or she was in prior to committing the tort (Kadish, 2012). Civil courts might inflict other conditions, like forbidding someone to perform something or changing an individual’s legal status in reference to a split marriage or a change of name (Kadish, 2012). Civil laws, at times, flow on due to criminal action and a civil court case can be victorious even when the defendant was not found guilty under criminal law. A famous case of this was the O.J. Simpson case in the United States, in which Simpson was not found guilty of killing his ex-wife and another male in a criminal court case, but found responsible for the tort of unlawful death in the civil court case, which followed (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). He was needed to reimburse US$33 million worth of damages to the victims’ families. Example of a Criminal Law Case and a Civil Law Case Another O. J. Simpson case, this time robbery, was a criminal case that was prosecuted in 2007–08, in Nevada, United States, basically concerning the ex-American footballer, O. J. Simpson (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). On 13th September, 2007, at night, a group of middle-aged men led by the main culprit, O. J. Simpson, entered a suite in the Palace Station inn, in Las Vegas. Fromong Bruce, a sports memorabilia vendor, confirmed that the group, led by Simpson, broke into the hotel room and stole a variety of sports memorabilia at gunpoint (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). 3 days afterwards, on 16th September, 2007, O. J. Simpson was detained for his participation in the robbery and also held without bail. He confessed to have taken the items that he argued had also been stolen from him, but without breaking into Fromong’s room (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). Simpson also rejected the accusation that he or the group with him had weapons. On 3rd October, 2008, (precisely 13 years after the day he was considered innocent for murders of his wife, Nicole Brown, as well as his friend, Ronald Goldman, O. J. Simpson was convicted of all 10 charges. On 5th December, 2008, the accused was sentenced to 33 years in penitentiary with eligibility for parole after 9 years (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). This case basically represented a criminal involving robbery whereby the accused was found guilty of robbing the plaintiff at gunpoint. Such a case, as earlier stated in this paper, falls under the felony category, and; therefore, the 9 to 33 years sentences on the accused was justifiable (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). In Horton v Sadler (2007), the appellant, Horton (H), petitioned against a ruling ([2004] EWCA Civ 936) implementing the normal three-year time perimeter under section 33 of the 1980 Limitation Act in his road-traffic disagreement against the respondents, Sadler (S). H had been wounded in a road incident where S was entirely accountable (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). S was not under insurance, and the Motor Insurers’ Bureau (MIB) chose insurers and made a temporary payment to H. Horton gave proceedings two days prior to the termination of the three-year restriction period, but failed to obey a state model of the MIB’s responsibility. Having been united as a group to the court proceedings, the MIB denied responsibility on the lack to obey the notice order, and counterclaimed for the repayment of its temporary payment (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). H then provided copy proceedings against S, offering the right notice to the MIB that was once more joined as a group to the second action (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). The insurance groups had defended the claim claiming that it was law-barred under section 11 of the 1980 Limitation Act. H reacted by seeking an order disapplying the normal three-year time perimeter under section 33 of the Act. The jury pointed that had it been allowable for it to disapply the time perimeter under section 33, it would have practiced its discretion in favour of H. Horton’s later appeal had been discharged rooted in binding authority, particularly, Precision Forgings Ltd v Walkley [1979] 1 WLR 606 (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). Horton submitted that the logic in Walkley could not be endorsed further. The Court of Appeal had sought to depend on fine merits to let it disapply Walkley in any future case where it was not severely limited to apply it. Horton also claimed that the ruling was not in agreement with the broad and unfettered discretion, which the legislation had aimed to give the court (Casenote Legal Briefs, 2012). Overlap of Civil Law with Criminal Law There is, according to Kadish (2012), some overlap between civil law and criminal law and. For instance, in English law, an assault is both a civil law and a criminal law; a form of trespass to the individual. A civil law allows someone, normally the victim, to receive a remedy, which serves their own goals, for instance, through the imbursement of damages to an individual injured or hurt in a car accident or receiving of injunctive relief to prevent someone who is meddling with their business (Kadish, 2012). On the other hand, criminal cases are pursued not to gain remedies to help a person – even though, normally criminal courts have the authority to offer such remedies – but to eliminate their liberation on the states behalf. That enlightens why imprisonment is normally available as a punishment for severe crimes, but not normally for civil laws. In early civil law, the difference between tort and crime was not clear (Kadish, 2012). An advice that I would offer a victim of criminal law is that the more harsh punishments available in criminal law also signify that it needs a higher burden of proof to be discharged compared to the related civil law. For example, in the Simpson murder trial explained earlier in this paper, the adjudicators were not swayed enough that O. J. Simpson had committed murder, but in a later civil case, the adjudicators in that case saw that there was enough proof to meet the standard of predominance of the proof needed to prove the civil law of wrongful death. Victims of criminal and civil law should know that many jurisdictions, particularly in the United States, retain punitive aspects in civil law damages, for instance in consumer-related and anti-trust civil cases, making tort distort the line with criminal laws. There are cases where also, especially if the defendant overlooks court orders, then a plaintiff can get a disciplinary remedy against the defendant and also imprisonment (Kadish, 2012). Some civil laws might have a public element and, at times, actions in civil laws will be taken by a public body. And finally, while criminal law is mainly punitive, most jurisdictions have created forms of monetary compensation, which criminal courts can straightforwardly order the defendant to reimburse to the victim. Bibliography CASENOTE LEGAL BRIEFS, Casenotes Legal Briefs: Criminal Law Keyed to Kadish, Schulhofer, Steiker, & Barkow (9th edn.; New York: Aspen Publishers, 2012). KADISH SANFORD H., et al., Criminal Law and Its Processes: Cases and Materials (9th edn.; New York: Aspen Publishers, 2012). Read More