September 22, 2004

The criminal-intent, or mens rea, prerequisite for criminal conviction has been eroding of late, especially in white-collar crime cases. Trent England of Heritage and Overcriminalized.com thinks the insider trading conviction of computer executive John Cassese -- which a judge threw out, but which prosecutors on appeal are trying to reinstate -- exemplifies the problem. A longer write-up appears on Overcriminalized.com. Susanna Cornett comments.