Frequently Asked Question About Criminal Defense

Q: What is a capital offense?
A: A crime for which the death penalty may be imposed.

Q: What is a common-law crime?
A: A crime that is punishable under the common law, rather than by force of statute.

Q: What is common law?
A: The body of law derived from judicial decisions, rather than from statutes or constitutions.

Q: What is a computer crime?
A: A crime requiring knowledge of computer technology, such as sabotaging or stealing computer data or using a computer to commit some other crime.

Q: What is corporate crime?
A: A crime committed wither by a corporate body or its representatives acting on its behalf.

Q: What is a crime of omission?
A: An offense that carries as its material component the failure to act.

Q: What is a crime of passion?
A: A crime committed in the heat of an emotionally charges moment, with no opportunity to reflect on what is happening.

Q: What is a federal crime?
A: A criminal offense under a federal statute.

Q: What is hate crime?
A: A crime motivated by the victim's race, color, ethnicity, religion, or national origin.

Q: What is white collar crime?
A: A nonviolent crime usually involving cheating or dishonesty in commercial matters.

Q: What is the Miranda rule?
A: The doctrine that a criminal suspect in police custody must be informed of certain constitutional rights before being interrogated.

Q: What is a criminal lawyer?
A: A lawyer whose primary work is to represent criminal defendants.

Q: What is criminal law?
A: The body of law defining offenses against the community at large, regulating how suspects are investigated, charged, and tried, and establishing punishments for convicted offenders.

Q: What is a felony?
A: A serious crime usually punishable by imprisonment for more than one year or by death.

Q: What is a misdemeanor?
A: A crime that is less serious than a felony and is usually punishable by fine, penalty, forfeiture, or confinement in a place other than prison.

	Did You Know?
	Res Ipsa Loquitur - Literally, "a thing that speaks for itself." In tort law, the doctrine which holds a defendant guilty of negligence without an actual showing that he or she was negligent. Its use is limited in theory to cases in which the cause of the plaintiff's injury was entirely under the control of the defendant, and the injury presumably could have been caused only by negligence.