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Main Content

Casebook Read Credits
Criminal Law
Section 6 . 1
42 minutes + 1 link

Accomplice Liability

Sam Kamin,
Dana Lindenberg

Most of the cases we have studied have involved only one criminal, and we have considered the culpability only of the principal actor committing the crime. In reality, however, many crimes implicate multiple people. Complicity (or accomplice liability or aiding and abetting liability) is not itself a crime; rather, it is a theory of liability whereby a person can be criminally liable as an accomplice. In aiding a person who commits a crime, an accomplice becomes personally liable for the other person’s crime. How far should such liability extend? To specifically intended results, to foreseeable results, or to all results that may occur? As you read these cases, note not only when courts attach accomplice liability, but also how far that liability extends.

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