•  1
    Criminalisation theorists who try to explain when substantive criminal law may appropriately be deployed to shrink the scope of our presumptive initial liberty, often take their project as requiring them to identify the sorts of conduct for which may the state criminally convict. I argue that this is a mistake. While such theories of ‘convictability’ have their place, they do not completely explain the use of substantive criminal law to limit our presumptive initial liberty. Convictions ensue on…Read more
  •  24
    A Philosophically Enriched Exegesis of Criminal Accessorial Liability
    UCL Journal of Law and Jurispridence 8 (1). 2019.
    The central features of the English criminal law’s approach to the liability of principal offender are fairly clear, coherent, and settled. By contrast, the English law of criminal accessorial liability is notoriously lacking in these qualities. In this paper, I attempt to correct this imbalance by developing a philosophically enriched exegesis (and where appropriate, critique) of the English law on criminal accessorial liability, by reference to the structures of responsibility underpinning Eng…Read more
  •  22
    Justifications and Rights-Displacements
    Criminal Law and Philosophy 18 (2): 519-535. 2024.
    In articles published ten years apart in 2011 and 2021, Gur-Arye argues that when considering an agent’s explanation for doing something that looks, prima facie, like a criminal offence, we should distinguish between a plea of justification, and an assertion that one acted within one’s power. The former explains an agent’s reasons for having committed a pro tanto offence (i.e., actus reus + mens rea). The latter is a denial that the agent committed any pro tanto offence at all. In this piece, I …Read more
  •  27
    Criminal Law Theory: Introduction
    with Alon Harel and Re’em Segev
    Criminal Law and Philosophy 18 (2): 493-496. 2024.
    This is an introduction to the special issue on criminal law theory.
  •  18
    Criminally Ignorant – an invitation for broader evaluation
    Jurisprudence 12 (2): 226-235. 2021.
    ABSTRACT Although there is much to commend in Sarch's Criminally Ignorant: Why the Law Pretends We Know What We Don't, in this piece, I invite Sarch to expand on his analysis by considering how English doctrine diverges from the US doctrine he takes as foundational, and raise some doubts by putting pressure on the theory of culpability that motivates his views on how ignorance supplies culpability. In particular, (a) I question his defence of a motive-insensitive theory of culpability, (b) set o…Read more
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