IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bpj/rlecon/v13y2017i1p18n3.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Malice Aforethought

Author

Listed:
  • Curry Philip A.

    (Department of Economics, University of Waterloo, Hagey Hall of the Humanities 200 University Ave W, Waterloo, ON N2L 3G1, Canada)

Abstract

This paper examines why criminal intent matters in sentencing. In particular, it considers two types of crimes, opportunistic and premeditated. Opportunistic crimes are ones that present themselves to a criminal and can be deterred if the victim makes it too costly for the criminal through private property protection. Premeditated crimes are ones sought out by the criminal, and the effect of private property protection is simply to displace crime. This difference between deterrence and displacement leads to the result that it is optimal to punish premeditated crimes more. The extent to which this is true, however, lies in the response by potential victims. If victims protect themselves from premeditated crimes in ways that also protect them from opportunistic ones, then the difference in penalties is relatively less.

Suggested Citation

  • Curry Philip A., 2017. "Malice Aforethought," Review of Law & Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 13(1), pages 1-18, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:bpj:rlecon:v:13:y:2017:i:1:p:18:n:3
    DOI: 10.1515/rle-2015-0032
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1515/rle-2015-0032
    Download Restriction: For access to full text, subscription to the journal or payment for the individual article is required.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1515/rle-2015-0032?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Steven Shavell & A. Mitchell Polinsky, 2000. "The Economic Theory of Public Enforcement of Law," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 38(1), pages 45-76, March.
    2. Gary S. Becker, 1974. "Crime and Punishment: An Economic Approach," NBER Chapters, in: Essays in the Economics of Crime and Punishment, pages 1-54, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Philip A. Curry & Matthew Doyle, 2016. "Integrating Market Alternatives Into The Economic Theory Of Optimal Deterrence," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 54(4), pages 1873-1883, October.
    4. George J. Stigler, 1974. "The Optimum Enforcement of Laws," NBER Chapters, in: Essays in the Economics of Crime and Punishment, pages 55-67, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Bruno Decreuse & Steeve Mongrain & Tanguy van Ypersele, 2022. "Property crime and private protection allocation within cities: Theory and evidence," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 60(3), pages 1142-1163, July.
    6. Louis Hotte & Tanguy van Ypersele, 2008. "Individual protection against property crime: decomposing the effects of protection observability," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 41(2), pages 537-563, May.
    7. Giles Atkinson & Andrew Healey & Susana Mourato, 2005. "Valuing the costs of violent crime: a stated preference approach," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 57(4), pages 559-585, October.
    8. Friedman, David & Sjostrom, William, 1993. "Hanged for a Sheep--The Economics of Marginal Deterrence," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 22(2), pages 345-366, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Philip A. Curry & Matthew Doyle, 2012. "Social Welfare and the Benefits to Crime," Working Papers 1205, University of Waterloo, Department of Economics, revised Jul 2012.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Philip A. Curry & Matthew Doyle, 2012. "Social Welfare and the Benefits to Crime," Working Papers 1205, University of Waterloo, Department of Economics, revised Jul 2012.
    2. Steven Shavell, 2003. "Economic Analysis of Public Law Enforcement and Criminal Law," NBER Working Papers 9698, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Laurent Franckx, 2004. "Marginal Deterrence Through Ambient Environmental Inspections," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 51(4), pages 507-527, September.
    4. Antonio Acconcia & Marcello D'Amato & Riccardo Martina, 2003. "Corruption and Tax Evasion with Competitive Bribes," CSEF Working Papers 112, Centre for Studies in Economics and Finance (CSEF), University of Naples, Italy.
    5. McCrary, Justin & Lee, David S., 2009. "The Deterrence Effect of Prison: Dynamic Theory and Evidence," Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics, Working Paper Series qt2gh1r30h, Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics.
    6. Emeline Bezin & Thierry Verdier & Yves Zenou, 2022. "Crime, Broken Families, and Punishment," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 14(4), pages 723-760, November.
    7. Giovanni Immordino & Marco Pagano, 2010. "Legal Standards, Enforcement, and Corruption," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 8(5), pages 1104-1132, September.
    8. David S. Lee & Justin McCrary, 2009. "The Deterrence Effect of Prison: Dynamic Theory and Evidence," Working Papers 1171, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section..
    9. Kishore Gawande & Alok K. Bohara, 2005. "Agency Problems in Law Enforcement: Theory and Application to the U.S. Coast Guard," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(11), pages 1593-1609, November.
    10. Lisa R. Anderson & Gregory DeAngelo & Winand Emons & Beth Freeborn & Hannes Lang, 2017. "Penalty Structures And Deterrence In A Two-Stage Model: Experimental Evidence," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 55(4), pages 1833-1867, October.
    11. Lampach, Nicolas & Wijtvliet, Wessel & Dyevre, Arthur, 2020. "Merchant hubs and spatial disparities in the private enforcement of international trade regimes," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    12. Taiyang Zhong & Xianjin Huang & Lifang Ye & Steffanie Scott, 2014. "The Impacts on Illegal Farmland Conversion of Adopting Remote Sensing Technology for Land Inspection in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 6(7), pages 1-26, July.
    13. Nøstbakken, Linda, 2008. "Fisheries law enforcement--A survey of the economic literature," Marine Policy, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 293-300, May.
    14. Amrita Dillon & MANDAR OAK, 2015. "Legalization of Bribe Giving when Bribe Type Is Endogenous," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 17(4), pages 580-604, August.
    15. Éric Langlais, 2010. "Les criminels aiment-ils le risque ?," Revue économique, Presses de Sciences-Po, vol. 61(2), pages 263-280.
    16. Thomas J. Miceli & Kathleen Segerson, 2007. "Punishing the Innocent along with the Guilty: The Economics of Individual versus Group Punishment," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 36(1), pages 81-106, January.
    17. Emons, Winand, 2007. "Escalating penalties for repeat offenders," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 170-178.
    18. Flores, Daniel, 2016. "Violence and law enforcement in markets for illegal goods," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 77-87.
    19. David S. Lee & Justin McCrary, 2009. "The Deterrence Effect of Prison: Dynamic Theory and Evidence," Working Papers 1168, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Center for Economic Policy Studies..

    More about this item

    Keywords

    crime; private property protection; criminal intent;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • K14 - Law and Economics - - Basic Areas of Law - - - Criminal Law
    • D60 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bpj:rlecon:v:13:y:2017:i:1:p:18:n:3. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Peter Golla (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.degruyter.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.