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Casebook Read Credits
Criminal Law Spring 2021
Section 2
2.5 hours + 2 links

II. Basic Principles

Jeannie Suk Gersen

Our study of criminal law will begin by examining basic elements of just punishment: (1) legality, the requirement that criminal punishment have a legal foundation; (2) actus reus, the actual proscribed conduct that constitutes the crime; and (3) mens rea, the state of mind necessary for a given action to be criminal.

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