Jpaul, you are an absolute starOriginally posted by JONNO_CELEBS+26 July 2003 - 22:24--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (JONNO_CELEBS @ 26 July 2003 - 22:24)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-JPaul@26 July 2003 - 21:22
Oddly enough Mens Rea (guilty knowledge) is feminine.
It has been bugging me for years what that meant
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Nice one dude![]()
Jonno B) [/b][/quote]
It's a law thing. Most criminal offences (other than absolute offences) require guilty knowledge.
That does not mean that the person believes the thing should be illegal, or have made some moral judgement and believe it is wrong
It means that they know it is an offence (against the law). So you have Actus Reus and Mens Rea. The person did something that was illegal and they knew that it was illegal.
Absolute offences do not require Mens Rea, if you do them it is an offence, whether you knew it or not. e.g in Scotland reset (dealing in stolen goods) is an absolute offence.
Is that too much information ?
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