Posted: March 11th, 2024

Assignment for Chapter 2 Criminal law

This is for a criminal law class

2-3 pages ill add funds if you go over.

Ask me if you have any questions

This chapter discussed limits on the ability of the government to create criminal laws or criminalize specific conduct. As a fundamental concept, these limits are designed to protect personal privacy and prevent government tyranny and overreach.

Consider potential laws that could exist and provide some analysis of their validity. The standards and protections you should consider in answering these questions are those discussed in the text and class.

Question 1. You and your sexual partner are not married under the laws where you live. The state proposes a law that will criminalize your relationship, forbidding you from living together and punishing you with incarceration if you slept in the same bedroom (in a private residence or hotel) in the last 365 days unless you get married. Which of the standards of criminal law discussed in this chapter will it pass and which standards will it fail?

Question 2. You own a round pizza cutter. The blade is three inches across (diameter) and it looks like this:

https://www.restaurantsupply.com/media/catalog/product/cache/47f90410e89ec696b19c8b5e4c63b554/p/p/ppc-4_winco-1_1.jpg (Links to an external site.)

The state has a law that forbids possession of any knife that is double-edged or has a cutting edge greater than four inches long in public or in a place to which the public has access unless required for occupational purposes. Although you work in a pizza shop, a police officer sees cutting a pizza with this knife on a table in your backyard for a party. The officer arrests you for violation of the knife law. What would your arguments be on the validity of this law and these criminal charges as the defense attorney?

Question 3. The state passes a law creating an additional fine for anyone caught violating traffic laws. Anyone who received a citation in the past 12 months is required to pay this new fine. The additional fine of $100 (one hundred dollars) is designed to increase access to justice and will allow the state to hire additional court personnel. You had four tickets in the last year and paid fines on all of them. You received a letter today from the state that you have $400 (four hundred dollars) in additional fines to pay and that your license / right to operate any motor vehicle will be suspended if not paid within seven days. Additionally, you will be arrested and your vehicle seized for default on your obligations if not paid in thirty days. You are prepared to argue against this law and these fines in court. What will your argument be?

Use only the textbook for any research and analysis you conduct. Submit your analysis and answers in three pages – no more than one double-spaced page per question. You are working ONLY from the textbook for research and analysis. You need citations and references ONLY if you ignore my instructions and use outside sources for research and analysis. If you do use outside resources for your research and analysis, you must use APA formatting for all aspects of the submission.

After studying this chapter, students will:
1. Understand and appreciate the reasons for the limits on criminal law and criminal punishment in the U.S. constitutional democracy.
2. Understand the principle of legality and the importance of its relationship to the limits of criminal law and punishment.
3. Appreciate the nature and importance of retroactive criminal law making.
4. Know the criteria for identifying vague laws and understand and appreciate their constitutional significance and consequences.
5. Understand and appreciate the rights defendants enjoy in criminal proceedings, the burden they have to support their affirmative defenses, and the requirement of the prosecution to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
6. Know, understand, and appreciate the limits placed on criminal law and criminal punishment by the specific provisions in the Bill of Rights.
7. Understand and appreciate the constitutional significance and consequences of the principle of proportionality in criminal punishment and its relation to “cruel and unusual punishment.”
8. Understand the importance of the right to trial by jury in the process of sentencing convicted offenders.

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