Criminal Law Concepts & Terminology Study Guide: 113 Flashcards from Actus Reus to the Rome Statute
Master criminal law with 113 flashcards: actus reus, mens rea, causation, thin skull rule, strict liability, offences, landmark cases (Pittwood, Blaue, Cunningham) and the ICC.
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Criminal law exams reward students who can define a doctrine precisely and name the case behind it. The Criminal Law: Concepts & Terminology deck (code NJ1832) on Flip It does exactly that: 113 flashcards pairing each concept with a tight definition and each landmark English case with its holding, from actus reus to the Rome Statute.
Study this deck: Criminal Law: Concepts & Terminology
1 / 10Criminal law
Tap the card for the answer · swipe right if you knew it, left if not
What's on the cards
| Front | Back |
|---|---|
| Actus reus | Latin for "guilty act" – the physical element of committing a crime, by action, threat of action, or (exceptionally) omission |
| Mens rea | Latin for "guilty mind" – the mental element, an intention to commit a wrongful act |
| Thin skull rule | Causation is not broken simply because a victim is particularly vulnerable |
| Doctrine of transferred malice | Intending to harm one person but harming another – the mens rea transfers to the person actually harmed |
| Strict liability | Criminal liability without mens rea, e.g. driving over the alcohol limit under the Road Traffic Act 1988 |
| Mala prohibita | Offences with no inherent wrongfulness – jaywalking, unlicensed fishing, parking violations |
| R v. Pittwood (1902) | A railway worker convicted of manslaughter for omitting to shut crossing gates – duty arising from contract |
| R v. Blaue (1975) | A Jehovah's Witness refused a blood transfusion and died from a stab wound – thin skull rule applied |
| R v. Cunningham (1957) | Defendant tore a gas meter from a wall without realising the danger – the subjective recklessness test |
| International Criminal Court | Established in 1998 by the Rome Statute |
Everything the deck covers
Grouped by the way most syllabuses teach it:
- Foundations – criminal vs civil law; the five objectives of punishment (retribution, deterrence, incapacitation, rehabilitation, restoration); statute as the main source; the codes of Ur-Nammu and Urukagina.
- Elements of a crime – actus reus, mens rea, the coincidence requirement, omission and the duty of care (contract, voluntary undertaking, blood relation, official position), intention vs motive, recklessness, transferred malice, strict and absolute liability.
- Causation – the "but for" test, proximate cause, thin skull rule, novus actus interveniens, whether medical mistakes sever the chain.
- Offences – murder and malice, first-degree gradation, manslaughter (voluntary, involuntary, gross negligence), provocation, diminished capacity, battery, assault, rape, trespass, embezzlement, robbery, arson, vandalism, conversion, fraud under the Fraud Act 2006.
- Participatory offences – aiding and abetting, conspiracy, attempt, and the Scots law equivalents.
- Defences – settled insanity, provocation, diminished capacity.
- Jurisdiction and international law – territorial, extraterritorial and universal jurisdiction, the Nuremberg trials, crimes against humanity, genocide, the ICC.
- Sentencing – capital and corporal punishment, incarceration, solitary confinement, house arrest, parole, probation.
- Cases – R v. Pittwood, R v. Stone and Dobinson, R v. Dytham, R v. Miller, Airedale NHS Trust v. Bland, R v. Pagett, R v. Blaue, R v. Mohan, R v. Cunningham.
Two tips for this deck
1. Study cases as duty-or-causation pairs. Four of the omission cases each illustrate one source of duty: Pittwood (contract), Stone and Dobinson (voluntary undertaking), Dytham (official position), Miller (creating a dangerous situation). Learn them as a set and you hold the whole omission doctrine in four names; do the same for causation with Pagett (third-party act) and Blaue (thin skull).
2. Drill the Latin as vocabulary, not law. Actus reus, mens rea, mala in se, mala prohibita, novus actus interveniens – the deck defines each one, and the fastest way to make them stick is to review those five cards as a mini-deck until you can translate them literally before you explain them legally.
Study plan
113 cards is one intensive week: 20 a day, then a cumulative day-seven review with the deck reversed (definition → term) to simulate issue spotting. Students heading for professional qualification will find the bar exam key concepts guide a natural next step.
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