Document Type
Article
Publication Date
Spring 2012
ISSN
1546-7619
Publisher
Ohio State University, Moritz College of Law
Language
en-US
Abstract
After clarifying the distinction between mistakes of fact and mistakes of law, this article explores in detail an important distinction within the category of mistake of law, between mistake about the criminal law itself and mistake about noncriminal law norms that the criminal law makes relevant - for example, about the civil law of property (in a theft prosecution) or of divorce (in a bigamy prosecution). The Model Penal Code seems to endorse the view that mistakes about noncriminal law norms should presumptively be treated as exculpatory in the same way as analogous mistakes about facts. Case law on the matter is more ambiguous.
Recommended Citation
Kenneth Simons,
Ignorance and Mistake of Criminal Law, Noncriminal Law, and Fact
,
in
9
Ohio State Journal of Criminal Law
487
(2012).
Available at:
https://scholarship.law.bu.edu/faculty_scholarship/19
