Assignment:
Now that we have come to the end of the class, you should be able to demonstrate your understanding of criminal law by authoring your own fictitious cases and then prosecuting, defending, and judging the cases. You will be creating three separate cases as discussed in the document below. Once you have prepared the facts for each case, you will argue on behalf of the prosecution, provide the defendant with a defense based on all of the defenses you have studied in this course, and impose a judgment and sentence on the defendant. It is important that the facts you create for each case provide sufficient information to allow for not only a possible conviction of a crime, but also a possible defense for each crime. Assume all of the cases are tried in front of a judge, and not a jury, so that as the judge you will make the final decision on the verdict and sentence, if any.
Instructions to Complete the Final Project:
1. Prepare fact patterns for THREE fictitious cases involving:
- A crime against persons
- A crime against property
- A quality of life crime
2. Before beginning your fact patterns, decide upon a crime for each of the three categories.
3. Then return to Lexis-Nexis and do the following:
- Log onto www.nec.edu, click on Library, and then on Library Online Resources
- Click under Lexis-Nexis Academic under "Danforth Databases"
- Enter your six-digit NEC ID # and log in
- On the top right of the Lexis-Nexis Academic, page click under Search by Content Type and then under "State Statutes and Regulations"
- Then click under Advanced Options, which is located under the Search Box
- Check off "Statutory Code" and then click under a state of your choice that you will use to find a statute
- You will conduct a search concerning the elements for each of the crimes you have decided upon. If you want you can use the statutes you located when completing the discussions in Weeks 4 and 5, but you will need to find a statute pertaining to one of the quality of life crimes, such as incest, bigamy, prostitution, disorderly conduct, rioting, vagrancy, loitering, indecent exposure, gambling, etc.
- Locate the statutory provisions that list the elements for each of the crimes that you selected and click under the documents selected. You might need to narrow your search by adding additional terms such as "elements" or "crime" into the "Search within result" box on the upper right-hand side of the page. Look through the items that are returned on your search until you find the statutory provisions that list the acts and intent for the crimes you have selected. Since you should be familiarizing yourself with new terminology, you should be able to easily eliminate statutory provisions that are not related to the elements of the crimes you are looking for. Don't give up. Sometimes all you need to do is change to a different state. If necessary, you may use different states to find statutory provisions for the three crimes you have selected
- Copy and paste the statutory provisions you found into a Word document or other word processing program, so that you can use the search information to complete your final project. You do not need to copy anything but the specific statutory provisions related to the elements of the crimes selected; so, for example, you do not need to copy anything you find below the History section. However, if you look through the History sections, this may give you some ideas for your fact patterns
4. Now prepare three separate fact patterns for the three crimes you selected. Make sure you give people names. You should have sufficient acts and intent within the three fact patterns to convict the defendants of the three crimes you have selected. However, you must provide one or more facts that would provide the defendant in each case with a defense.
5. To complete your final project, you will take on the roles of prosecutor, defense attorney, and judge for each of the three case (fact patterns) that you have created. You will do the following:
- Prosecution: For each fact pattern, copy and paste a copy of the statute into your final project and then apply the elements of the statute to the facts of each case in explaining how you will convict the defendant of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. Remember, for a crime to be committed there must be an actus reus, mens rea, and possibly circumstances, causation, and bad result. Use your text to make sure you adequately cover all elements necessary for commission of the crime, but your discussion must be based on the statute you have selected for each crime.
- Defense: Now you will act on behalf of the defendant as the defense attorney. Present at least ONE viable defense for the defendant. Explain why you believe this defense applies to the crime charged. You may need to adjust your fact pattern if you cannot come up with a viable defense.
- Verdict and Sentence: Finally, you are acting as the judge in the three cases you have created. Determine a verdict for each case, justify your verdict, and impose a sentence, if any, on the defendant. To help you in determining a sentence, you might want to return to Lexis-Nexis and see what sentence would apply to a guilty verdict for the crimes you have selected.
6. Prepare a reference list at the end of your final project. Within your reference list you will list any resources you have used. At a minimum you should list your textbook and the three statutes you have used. Use APA format. Here is a link for providing APA formatting of legal materials: https://lib.westfield.ma.edu/citeapa
The basic format for a statute is as follows:
State name abbreviated and name of code or statute, chapter #, section #.
Ex: Mass. Gen. Laws, ch. 71. Section 2.
7. The recommended format for your final project is:
a. Crime against person fact pattern
- Prosecution
- Defense
- Verdict and sentence
b. Crime against property fact pattern
- Prosecution
- Defense
- Verdict and sentence
c. Quality of life crime fact pattern
- Prosecution
- Defense
- Verdict and sentence
d. References
8. There is no required length for the final project, but it should be long enough to enable you to discuss fully all of the required components.