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Factual guilt vs. legal guilt

"Guilty party" redirects here. For other uses, see Guilty Party (disambiguation).
Attribution of guilt as a social
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Moral and legal definitions
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See also
In criminal law, guilt is the state of being responsible for the commission of an offense.[1] Legal guilt is Criminal procedure
References entirely externally defined by the state, or more generally a "court of law". Being factually guilty of a criminal
Criminal trials and convictions
External links offense means that one has committed a violation of criminal law or performed all the elements of the
Rights of the accused
offense set out by a criminal statute.[2] The determination that one has committed that violation is made by Fair trial · Pre-trial · Speedy trial · Jury trial ·
an external body (a "court of law") after the determination of the facts by a finder of fact or "factfinder" (i.e., Counsel · Presumption of innocence ·
a jury) and is, therefore, as definitive as the record-keeping of the body. For instance, in the case of a Exclusionary rule1 · Self-incrimination ·
Double jeopardy2 · Bail · Appeal
bench trial, a judge acts as both the court of law and the factfinder, whereas in a jury trial, the jury is the
Verdict
trier of fact and the judge acts only as the trier of law.
Conviction · Acquittal · Not proven3 ·
Directed verdict
Factual guilt vs. legal guilt [ edit ] Sentencing
Mandatory · Suspended · Custodial · Periodic ·
In the United States, there exists factual guilt and legal guilt. Factual guilt relates to a person having Discharge · Guidelines · Guilt
factually committed a crime. This implies that the person fulfilled the requirements necessary for the Totality5, 6 · Dangerous offender4, 5
Capital punishment · Execution warrant
offense to have occurred, such as the elements of the crime and their constitutive philosophical framework.
Cruel and unusual punishment
However, it is not possible to prove that someone has factually committed a crime. Relative to this inability Imprisonment · Life imprisonment ·
to conclusively prove factual guilt, the Münchhausen trilemma exemplifies that it is impossible to prove any Indefinite imprisonment · Three-strikes law
truth. As it is impossible to prove factual guilt, a prosecutor must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a Post-sentencing
defendant has committed a crime. As such, the prosecutor is required to prove the defendant's legal guilt. Parole · Probation · Tariff 6 · Life licence6 ·
Criminal justice · Exoneration ·
The factfinder(s) in a criminal court case, through encountering evidence, determines whether there is Habitual offender · Miscarriage of justice ·
Pardon · Recidivism · Rehabilitation ·
sufficient evidence to substantiate a finding that the defendant committed the crime beyond a reasonable
Restorative justice · Sex offender registry ·
doubt. This may or may not be a reasonable finding, however. Thus, although a defendant may be found Sexually violent predator laws1
guilty beyond a reasonable doubt (thus, found legally guilty) of having committed a crime, such as to Related areas of law
substantiate a conviction, such a finding does not necessarily imply that the defendant was factually found Civil procedure · Criminal defenses ·
legally guilty. Related to this matter are convictions in criminal cases that are overturned by new evidence Criminal law · Evidence

(such as in DNA exoneration cases), such that the finding of legal guilt is found by a different factfinder to Portals
have been unreasonable; thus, legal guilt is found to have not been factually found or substantiated: This Law portal
new finding itself, however, is not necessarily factual either.
1
US courts · 2 Not in English/Welsh courts · 3 Scottish courts ·
4
English/Welsh courts · 5 Canadian courts · 6 UK courts

Attribution of guilt as a social function [ edit ] · ·

Philosophically, guilt in criminal law reflects a functioning society and its ability to condemn individuals'
actions. It rests fundamentally on a presumption of free will, such as from a compatibilist perspective (as in the
U.S.A.), in which individuals choose actions and are, therefore, subjected to the external judgement of the
rightness or wrongness of those actions. As described by Judge Alvin B. Rubin in United States v. Lyons (1984):

An adjudication of guilt is more than a factual determination that the defendant pulled a trigger, took
a bicycle, or sold heroin. It is a moral judgment that the individual is blameworthy. Our collective
conscience does not allow punishment where it cannot impose blame. Our concept of
blameworthiness rests on assumptions that are older than the Republic: man is naturally endowed
with these two great faculties, understanding and liberty of will. Historically, our substantive criminal
law is based on a theory of punishing the viscious [sic] will. It postulates a free agent confronted
with a choice between doing right and wrong, and choosing freely to do wrong.[3]
Orestes Pursued by the Furies, by
John Singer Sargent. 1921. The
Moral and legal definitions [ edit ] erinyes represent the guilt for
murdering his mother.
"Guilt" is the obligation of a person who has violated a moral standard to bear the sanctions imposed by that
moral standard. In legal terms, guilt means having been found to have violated a criminal law,[1] though the law
also raises 'the issue of defences, pleas, the mitigation of offences, and the defeasibility of claims'.[4]

Les Parrott draws a three-fold distinction between "objective or legal guilt, which occurs when society's laws have been broken... social guilt...[over] an
unwritten law of social expectation", and finally the way "personal guilt occurs when someone compromises one's own standards".[5]

Remedies [ edit ]

Guilt can sometimes be remedied by: punishment (a common action and advised or required in many legal and moral codes); forgiveness (as in
transformative justice); making amends (see reparation or acts of reparation), or "restitution ... an important step in finding freedom from real guilt';[6] or
by sincere remorse (as with confession in Catholicism or restorative justice). Guilt can also be remedied through intellectualisation or cognition [7] (the
understanding that the source of the guilty feelings was illogical or irrelevant). Helping other people can also help relieve guilt feelings: "Thus guilty
people are often helpful people ... helping, like receiving an external reward, seemed to get people feeling better".[8] There are also the so-called "Don
Juans of achievement ... who pay the installments due their superego not by suffering but by achievements.... Since no achievement succeeds in really
undoing the unconscious guilt, these persons are compelled to run from one achievement to another".[9]

Law does not usually accept the agent's self-punishment, but some ancient codes did: in Athens, the accused could propose a remedy, which could be a
reward, while the accuser proposed another, and the jury chose something in-between. This forced the accused to effectively bet on his support in the
community, as Socrates did when he proposed "room and board in the town hall" as his fate. He lost and drank hemlock, a poison, as advised by his
accuser.

See also [ edit ]

Culpability
Wikiquote has quotations
Erinyes related to Guilt.
Malum in se
Malum prohibitum

References [ edit ]

1. ^ a b "guilt" , The Free Dictionary, retrieved 2021-12-18 5. ^ Les Parrott, Shoulda Coulda Woulda (2003) p. 87
2. ^ See generally United States v. Rivera-Gomez, 67 F.3d 993, 997 (1st Cir. 6. ^ Parrott, p. 152-3
1995) . 7. ^ see cognitive therapy under Cognitive therapy
3. ^ UNITED STATES v. LYONS, 739 F.2d 994, 995 (5th Cir. 1984) (Rubin, J. 8. ^ E. R. Smith/D. M. Mackie, Social Psychology (2007) p. 527-8
dissenting) (internal citations omitted). 9. ^ Fenichel, p. 502
4. ^ Erving Goffman, Relations in Public (Penguin 1972) p. 139

External links [ edit ]

"Guilt in Think On These Things" . Archived from the original on January 17, 2006. Retrieved
Look up guilt in Wiktionary,
2006-02-16. by Gary Gilley the free dictionary.
"The Innocent Bear the Guilt for the Guilty Ones" . Retrieved 2007-05-10. by Gerd Altendorff translation by
Jochen Reiss Look up guilty in Wiktionary,
the free dictionary.
Learnt or innate
Guilt on In Our Time at the BBC

Authority control databases [hide]

National Germany · Israel · United States

Other Encyclopedia of Modern Ukraine (2 )

Categories: Criminal procedure Guilt Criminal law legal terminology

This page was last edited on 6 February 2024, at 18:44 (UTC).

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