Criminal Law

Chapter 8

Inchoate Crimes:Attempt, Conspiracy, and

Solicitation

Joel Samaha, 9th Ed.

Inchoate Crimes

Offenses based on crimes not yet committed.

Each inchoate offense has its own elements, but they all share two elements:

the mens rea of purpose or specific intent and the actus reus of taking some steps

toward accomplishing the criminal purpose – but not enough steps to complete the intended crime.

These offenses include: Criminal attempt, criminal conspiracy,

and criminal solicitation.

Inchoate Offenses

Criminal attempts: trying commit crimes.

Criminal conspiracy: making agreements with someone else to commit a crime.

Criminal solicitation: trying to get someone else to commit a crime.

Attempt

1) Intent or purpose to commit a specific crime.

2) An act, or acts, to carry out the intent.

* (statutes vary among states as to specific or general attempt).

Attempt – Mens Rea

Purpose to engage in criminal conduct or cause a criminal result.

Discuss the facts and opinion of:

People v. Kimball311 N.W.2d 343 (1981 Mich.App.

People v. MorelandWL 459026 (Cal.App. 2 Dist. 2002)

Attempt – Actus Reus

Model Penal Code’s ‘Substantial Steps Test’ for actus reus.

Two elements: 1) “substantial steps” toward completing the

crime and 2) steps that “strongly corroborate

the actor’s purpose.”

Attempt – Actus Reus

The MPC requires that attempters take enough steps toward completing the crime

not to show that a crime is about to occur but to prove that the attempters are determined to

commit it.

The following are examples of “substantial steps” if they strongly corroborate the actor’s criminal purpose to

commit the intended crime:

Lying in wait; enticing the contemplated victim to go to the contemplated place for its commission;

reconnoitering (“casing”); unlawful entry; possession of materials to be employed

in the commission of the crime; soliciting an innocent agent.

Attempt: Actus Reus

Discuss the facts and opinion of:

Young v. State493 A.2d 352 (Md. 1985)

People v. Rizzo (1927)

Commonwealth v. Peaslee (1901)

Impossibility

Explain the difference between legal impossibility and factual impossibility.

What is an extraneous factor?

Discuss the facts and opinion in:

State v. Damms100 N.W.2d 592 (Wis. 1960)

State v. Robbins (2002)

State v. Kordas (1995)

Abandonment

Does the voluntary abandonment defense relieve a would-be criminal of criminal

liability?

How would an extraneous factor influence this defense?

Discuss the facts and opinion in:

LeBarron v. State145 N.W.2d 79 (Wis. 1966)

Conspiracy

Actus reus for conspiracy consists of

1) an agreement* to commit a crime (in all states) and

2) an overt act in furtherance of the agreement

(in half of the states and the federal courts).

Discuss the opinion and facts in:U.S v. Garcia

151 F.3d 1243 (CA9 1998)

* The act of agreement between two or more people to commit a crime.

Conspiracy

Mens rea for conspiracy is not clearly defined.

Is it a specific-intent crime?In other words, intent to attain a specific

objective.

Does the mens rea require purpose?

How does the Model Penal Code define conspiracy?

Conspiracy

The traditional definition of conspiracy includes the attendant circumstance

element that agreements involve “two or more parties agreeing or combining to

commit a crime (MPC).

However, the unilateral approach in most modern statues does not require that all

conspirators agree-or even know-the other conspirators.

What are wheel and chain conspiracies?

Does conspiracy enhance RICO statutes? If so, in what way?

Solicitation

The actus reus in criminal solicitation consists of words

that induce someone to commit a crime, e.g., advises, commands, entices, induces, urges,

solicits.

The mens rea in criminal solicitation requires words that convey that their purpose is

to get someone to commit a specific crime.

Therefore, solicitation is a specific-intent crime – a crime of purpose

(some states require the objective to committing felonies or violent felonies).

Solicitation

Discuss the facts and opinion of:

State v. Cotton790 P.2d 1050 (N.M.App. 1990)