On March 24, our State Tax University hosted a distinguished guest professor Isis Misdary directs the Criminal Defense and Community Advocacy Clinic and teaches Criminal Law at Seton Hall University School of Law in Newark, New Jersey in the United States.

She is an experienced practicing lawyer and a defender. Professor Misdary was proud to work as a public defender for several years at the Defender Association of Philadelphia, in the Municipal Court, Children and Youth Justice, Felony Waivers, and Major Felonies/Jury Trial units.

Her lecture covered both theoretical and to a significant extent practical matters related to the topic: "The Rise and Fall of Mens Rea: A Comparative Analysis of the Felony Murder in the Model Penal Code and the English Common Law".

The lecture's main topic was the shortcomings of the traditional application of mens rea in judicial proceedings and the rendering of decisions in criminal cases, particularly felony murder in the USA.    Special emphasis was paid to the distinction between "common law jurisdictions" and "Model Penal Code jurisdictions."  First issued in 1962, the Model Penal law (abbreviated MPC) is a model law compiled by the American Legal Institute.  Significant changes were made to several states' criminal codes after the MPC was enacted, and many states still base their criminal laws on it today.

The MPC is divided into four sections: (I) general liability principles; (II) offense definitions; (III) treatment and correctional provisions; and (IV) prisons department and division organization requirements.

Even in states that have not enacted any of the Model Penal Code's provisions, many courts will nonetheless refer to and reference it as persuasive authority. No state has made the complete Model Penal Code from the American Law Institute its state criminal law.  However, these labels convey a fundamental distinction regarding the mental state requirements of criminal statutes: "common law jurisdictions" are those where the state's statutes and case law still use common law-developed terms like "general intent," "specific intent," and "malice."

States that have abandoned these terms and substituted statutory definitions of terms like "purposely," "knowingly," "recklessly," and "negligently," which were taken from the MPC, along with some MPC-inspired guidelines for figuring out exactly what these terms mean in a given criminal statute, are known as "Model Penal Code jurisdictions."

The lecture absorbed all the allocated time in one breath and was followed by insightful Q&A session. Given such a wonderful contents and outcome of the event we definitely look forward to seeing more lectures from Professor Isis Misdary in the future and appreciate her time and knowledge for the benefit of our students and faculty.