Actus reus

Actus reus is the external element of a crime: prohibited conduct, circumstances, or consequences. Criminal liability generally requires it alongside the required mental state.

Mens rea: The mental element of a crime, such as intent, knowledge, recklessness, or negligence. Criminal liability commonly requires this mental element alongside the prohibited external element.
Martin v. State: An Alabama case holding that involuntary appearance in public, after police carried a man there, did not satisfy the charged offense. It illustrates why criminal liability requires voluntary conduct rather than mere presence.
Status offense: An offense based on a person’s condition or status rather than a specific prohibited act. The doctrine generally rejects criminal punishment based solely on status without voluntary conduct.
Homicide: The killing of one person by another, with legal classifications depending on circumstances and mental state. Homicide makes the result element and causal link especially visible.
Common law: A legal system whose rules develop through judicial decisions as well as legislation. Common-law courts shaped the familiar distinction between actus reus and mens rea.
Voluntary act: A bodily movement controlled by the actor, rather than a reflex or movement during unconsciousness. A voluntary act is the usual conduct basis for establishing actus reus.
State v. Utter: A Washington case addressing whether a soldier’s alleged reflexive stabbing during a dissociative state was voluntary. The case tests whether conduct during an asserted automatism can satisfy the voluntary-act requirement.
Criminal attempt: An incomplete crime involving intent to commit an offense and conduct that sufficiently advances toward its commission. Attempt law asks how far conduct must progress before it becomes a punishable external element.
Theft: The unlawful taking or appropriation of property belonging to another, as defined by a jurisdiction’s law. The offense combines a physical appropriation with circumstances concerning ownership and consent.
Edward Coke: An English jurist and politician whose writings strongly influenced common-law legal doctrine. Coke’s legal writings helped transmit early formulations linking criminal liability to act and intent.

Linked from 16 pages