Course 2024-2025 a.y.

The course is organized around key themes in criminal law, designed to provide students with a foundational understanding and practical insights into the administration of criminal justice globally. The content is divided into several macro-topics, each addressing significant areas within criminal law:

• Foundations of Criminal Law: Introduction to the fundamental principles that underpin criminal law across various jurisdictions, setting the stage for more detailed studies in specific areas of criminal law.
• Aims and Functions of Criminal Law: Objectives behind criminal law, such as retribution, deterrence, rehabilitation, and restorative justice.
• Constitutional Foundations and Human Rights in Criminal Law: How, if at all, constitutions and international human rights frameworks influence criminal liability and enforcement.
• Elements of Criminal Conduct: Essential elements of a criminal offence: the actus reus (guilty act) and mens rea (guilty mind).
• Justifications and Excuses in Criminal Law: Defenses such as self-defense, necessity, duress, and insanity, and their legal implications.
• Complicity: Legal theories related to aiding and abetting the commission of a crime.
• Inchoate Offences: Attempted crime, conspiracy and provocation.
• Sentencing and Criminal Sanctions: Overview of different sentencing theories, the role of judicial discretion in sentencing, and how various legal systems approach the imposition of punishments, including confiscation measures.
• Criminal Liability of Legal Persons: How legal entities can be held accountable for criminal activities.
• Specific Crimes: Homicide and non-fatal offences (including sex offences) against the person, existing in every legal system.
• Transnational Crimes: Introduction to crimes with a cross-border dimension, harmonized by international legal instruments, such as human trafficking, drug trafficking, and cybercrime.
• Criminal Law in International and Supranational Contexts: Focus on the impact of EU law on national criminal systems, extraterritorial jurisdiction for crimes committed abroad, and a brief overview of international criminal law.

1. Identify the core principles and theories underpinning criminal law across different legal systems, including the functions and purposes of criminal punishment.
2. Describe the influence of constitutional and international human rights constraints on criminal liability and enforcement practices worldwide.
3. Explain the concepts of actus reus (guilty act) and mens rea (guilty mind), and how these foundational elements are required for criminal liability.
4. Outline the various justifications and excuses available in criminal law, such as self-defense, necessity, and duress, across multiple legal jurisdictions.
5. Summarize the sentencing processes, the types of criminal penalties, and their execution within different legal frameworks.
6. Discuss specific crimes such as homicide, non-fatal offences against the person, and transnational crimes, detailing their legal definitions and requisite elements.

1. Analyze case studies to determine the applicable principles of criminal law and to assess the appropriateness of the legal outcomes based on international standards.
2. Evaluate the effectiveness of different criminal justice systems in upholding fundamental human rights and effectively tackling criminal threats.
3. Apply the basic principles of criminal law, such as the principle of legality and proportionality, to hypothetical legal scenarios, demonstrating an understanding of their practical implications in judicial decision-making.
4. Demonstrate practical skills in legal reasoning and argumentation, using examples from diverse legal systems to support conclusions about criminal liability and defenses.
5. Develop independent analytical skills to interpret and apply general legal rules to specific criminal statutes in both real and hypothetical cases, effectively addressing new legal challenges through personal study, legal research, and reasoned argumentation, using clear and precise legal language.

• Lectures
• Guest speaker's talks (in class or in distance)
• Collaborative Works / Assignments
• Interaction/Gamification

• Lectures: Traditional face-to-face lectures will introduce students to the foundational principles of criminal law. This format facilitates the delivery of core content and allows for real-time clarification of complex legal concepts.
• Guest Speaker’s Talks: Esteemed practitioners and scholars in the field of criminal law will deliver talks, sharing their real-world experiences and insights. These sessions provide valuable perspectives that enrich the students’ understanding of practical legal applications.
• Collaborative Works / Assignments: In the latter part of the course, students will work in groups to analyze recent, controversial cases related to criminal law. Each group will be tasked with writing a short paper and presenting their findings in class, based on specific guidelines provided by the instructor. This collaborative work will help students develop their research, writing, and presentation skills, crucial for their future legal careers
• Interactive Class Activities: To deepen understanding and foster critical thinking skills, the course will include interactive activities such as mock trials. Students will be assigned a case, which may be real or fictional, involving pertinent criminal law issues and will be tasked to assume the roles of either the prosecution or the defense. They will then present their arguments in a simulated courtroom setting. These activities are designed to enable students to practice legal reasoning and argumentation in a controlled, experiential learning environment. Students will be encouraged to actively participate, bring their own views, share insights, and engage in discussions to enhance their learning experience.

The assessment for attending students is structured to measure the acquisition of the above mentioned intended learning outcomes. The overall grade is derived from the following components:

1. Mid-term Written Exam (5 points of the final grade): This exam will consist of open-ended questions that test students’ understanding of fundamental principles and theories in criminal law. It focuses on theoretical knowledge and the application to basic case scenario.
2. Group Assignment (5 points of the final grade): Groups of students will be tasked with analyzing a specific criminal law case or a legal issue, which they will present to the class. This assessment aims to evaluate the students’ teamwork skills, their ability to apply learned concepts to real-world or hypothetical legal problems, and their capability to critically assess and articulate the implications of criminal law principles. Each student’s contribution to the group effort will be individually assessed.
3. Written Exam (20 points of the final grade): The written exam will consist of comprehensive open-ended questions that cover:

• Theoretical Questions: These questions will test students’ understanding of fundamental principles and theories in criminal law. It aims to assess their knowledge and their ability to articulate this knowledge clearly.
• Practical Questions: These questions will involve solving a case study or detailing the constitutive elements of a specific crime. These questions are designed to evaluate the students’ ability to apply their theoretical knowledge to practical situations, demonstrating their understanding of how criminal law operates within real-life contexts.

For students who are not attending, the assessment will mirror that of attending students in terms of content but will be based solely on a comprehensive final written exam covering all course materials. This exam will consist of open-ended questions, similar in structure and purpose to those described for attending students. The exam is specifically designed to assess their understanding of key learning outcomes such as applying legal principles to complex factual scenarios, demonstrating knowledge of criminal law theories, and effectively arguing legal positions through coherent legal reasoning.

Teaching materials will include instructor’s slide presentations, court decisions, and other materials discussed during the lessons, along with additional selected readings. These materials will be detailed prior to the start of each lesson and made available through the online Blackboard platform.

Non-attending students will be required to study all materials uploaded to the Blackboard online platform, along with a textbook tentatively indicated in Markus Dubber and Tatjana Hornle (2016), Criminal Law. A Comparative Approach, Oxford University Press. The final selection of the textbook will be confirmed before the beginning of the classes.