CRIMINAL LAW INDUCTION (OCTOBER 2023)

Dr Laura Lammasniemi

Mini Lecture Video Transcript

Hello everyone, and welcome to this induction to criminal law. I'm delighted to be here. My name is
Dr. Laura Lammasniemi. I am the convener of criminal law as of this year. I am also an Associate
Professor of Criminal Law at University of Warwick. Those of you who don't know England that
well, the University of Warwick is in the Midlands, so it's bang in the middle of the country, and I'm
joining you on quite a rainy day, I have to say, from the Midlands. If you already looked around the
VLE, you would have already probably seen me somewhere. You might have heard my voice, so
now you can put a face to the voice that you would have heard. You would have also probably
seen the materials done by Professor William Wilson. Professor William Wilson has been the
convener of criminal law for many years, and he has now taken up a very well-deserved
retirement, and I will be taking over from this year.
What we'll do in this shortish induction to criminal law is that I'll start off with a presentation, about
20 minutes or so, just walking you through the basic elements of the course, the module, how to
study criminal law, and how to study this particular course. Then we will have plenty of time for
questions. You can post your questions at the end of the presentation. It might be that you have
some questions that I'll cover as I go through my presentation. Anything that I don't cover, please
ask and we'll have plenty of time to go through them.
I think we'll start off with the presentation. What we'll do in this shortish presentation is we'll start off
with thinking about what is criminal law, and how does criminal law maybe differ from some of the
things you would have already studied, or might be studying now at the same time. Then we'll
introduce the module, what do we study in this particular module, and then at the end, we'll think a
little bit about tips and things that will make studying criminal law easier. In that part, I'll also cover
some of the questions that we already had on the VLE. We had some really good questions before
this induction, so I'll try to answer them there at the end.
Before we sort of start thinking about the nature of criminal law, I want to ask you a question. That
question is, "Did I commit any crimes this week?" To get started you don't need to share your
answer, so you don't need to put this in the chat, particularly if you have done something
questionable, please don't feel like you need to share it. Take a moment to think about it. Think
about your week, what did you do this week, and think about, actually, was there any point in this
week that I broke criminal law? I say "this week" because I am convinced that every single person
who is attending here today, myself included, every one of us would have broken the law at some
point in our lives.
If you think about your week, perhaps you were driving to work and you were running a bit late and
you were speeding. Maybe you were coming back from work and you saw some messages pop up
when you were driving and you checked those messages. Maybe you downloaded some articles
that you shouldn't have downloaded. That's just a demonstration of how, actually, every part of our
life is governed by criminal law in a way that we don't necessarily think about it. When we are
thinking about criminal law, we think about those really big important things. We think about
murder, we think about serious violence, we think about sexual violence, but we don't necessarily
think about health and safety, nor do we think about downloading illegal videos, or we don't think
about speeding. Actually these crimes, these small everyday crimes, they take up the bulk of
criminal law in the way that it governs our daily existence. This is why criminal law is actually a little

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bit different from some of the other modules that we study. Is that every aspect of your life is
regulated by criminal law. Whether it's your relationships, whether it's health and safety at work, all
these things are things that we don't necessarily think about, but they are regulated by criminal
law. There are sanctions that we will have to face up to if we break these aspects of criminal law.
Another thing I think where criminal law sort of is a little bit different from some other models is that
it's absolutely everywhere. When you read the news, you switch on your TV, maybe you're reading
a book, criminal law is a hugely popular form of entertainment. You will see detective stories, true
crime documentaries, TV series, all these things that I was just speaking about, courtroom
traumas, serious violence, and crime are an important part of entertainment. It fascinates people, it
entertains people, but it's also something that I think quite a lot of people are terrified of. Because
we are so familiar with criminal law from all this TV and all these movies and everything that we've
been watching, it does mean that sometimes when we start to study criminal law, we come with a
set of presumptions and some assumptions that might not be true. Sometimes people assume that
violent crime is very common or that homicide is very common, whereas actually, homicide counts
for a tiny miniscule part of all offenses, and even a smaller part of violent crime.
One of your jobs as students of criminal law is to put all those sorts of assumptions and everything
that you know from the past aside, and then start thinking about criminal law and the rules from a
fresh perspective.
Then the final thing I wanted to say why I think criminal law is a little bit different from some of the
other things, is that some of you would have intimate experiences of crime in a way that you might
not have with other areas of law. You might have intimate experiences of criminal justice system as
well, as perpetrators, as victims, as jurors, as people who might have witnessed things. It's
important to bear this in mind. When we are having our discussions either today or throughout the
term, or maybe your classroom discussions in your centers, or your post in the forum that you have
throughout the year, just keep that in mind that as much as we are talking about hypothetical
scenarios, we are also talking about scenarios that are very much part of some people's lived life
experiences.
That's then sort of the broad spectrum of criminal law. Where do we sort of start finding criminal
law? I say that criminal law is absolutely everywhere in our daily lives, which is true. Then what
then is criminal law? I've given you here on the screen two quite different definitions of what
criminal law is. The first one is a very factual, correct, but factual one. It says, "Criminal law is a
body of rules that sets out the definitions of criminal offenses and describes punishments." This is
an absolutely factually correct description. It is a body of rules. It does tell us the definitions and
offenses. This definition doesn't give us a lot in terms of understanding what criminal law actually
is. I've given you then another more conceptual definition, which says, "Criminal law is politically
determined restriction on individuals' rights through the threat or the imposition of penal sanction."
This, I think, is a much better definition, because here, we are starting to get to the essence of
what criminal law is. Effectively, what criminal law is, this body of work, it's a series of restrictions.
It's a series of restrictions on your freedom and a series of restrictions on your rights. Criminal law
is the body of law that says you cannot do this. It says you cannot take a phone that doesn't belong
to you. It says you cannot have sex with a person who doesn't want to have sex with you. It says
just because you're angry, you cannot go around punching people.
At the core of what criminal law is and what it does, it sort of continuously restricts our daily
activities, and it continually puts impositions and restrictions on what we can and what we cannot
do. At the core of criminal law, there's always this sort of balancing exercise to be had, this sort of
quite a delicate balance between putting those restrictions on individuals and then protecting the
society and other individuals. At the core of all criminal laws, we have this attempt to find this
balance between protecting individuals and then restricting the rights of others. Some laws do it
well, and some laws sort of fall on either side, either becoming too protectionist or becoming too

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unlimiting, I suppose. That's sort of the essence of criminal law, sort of trying to find that sweet
balance between restriction and protection.
Then, within this great body of work that is criminal law, we have individual criminal offenses.
Individual criminal offenses take many different forms. We have offenses that we'll study together,
like murder, rape, theft, criminal damage, so all sorts of different kinds of offenses. Effectively, what
nearly all criminal offenses do is they prohibit certain kinds of acts, omissions, or results.
For example, if you think about a criminal law that prohibits certain acts, we would have something
like theft. It says you cannot take items that do not belong to you. Then you have omissions.
Omission is when a person is failing to act. Criminal law would say if a parent fails to feed their
child and does not feed their child, that is a criminal offense. Then we have certain results that can
be criminalized. Criminal damage would be an example of this. For example, if a person throws a
stone in the air, that is not a criminal offense, it is not a lawful act. If that stone then breaks a
window, it becomes a criminal offense because of that result. As you're working through your
studies, you'll see that most offenses that you study can neatly fall into one of these three
categories.
Where criminal law then differs from some of the other things you might have studied or you might
study now, such as tort or contract law, is that criminal law involves the state. If you're thinking
about your studies of tort or you think about the studies of contract, we have two individuals who
might have come to an agreement that they really work out, or individuals who might have wronged
each other and they're trying to work it out. Criminal law goes beyond that. It's not about two
individuals, but it's always about individual and the state. In criminal law, the law is saying that
whatever the person did, it was so bad that it's no longer an individual matter, but this is a matter
for the state to intervene. It is for the state to investigate it, it is for a state to prosecute, it is for the
state to punish. Criminal law is always about that public violation. It's a violation against the state
and the society as much as it is against any individual.
In that place, when we talk about criminal law as something that maintains public order, it comes to
this point. The state is saying you cannot just go around stealing anything you want because that is
disrupting the public order. A very clear illustration of this point is the fact that all crimes in England
or Wales are prosecuted by the state. Then the case names always begin with R against whoever
it is. In criminal cases, R here stands for Rex or Regina, either the king or monarch. Most of the
cases that you study would have been heard under the reign of Queen Elizabeth. Most of the time
would have been Regina against whoever it is. All the crimes that are going through the Crown
Court today, there would be Rex against whoever the individual is, to note for the fact that now we
have a new monarch who is King Charles. There's this recognition already the name of the case
that is a crime against the state that is also a crime against the monarch when you do something
wrong to another person. That's broadly criminal offenses.
Then, within this body of criminal offenses, what we focus on in this course in the LLB is English
criminal law. Sometimes students talk about UK law, and not just students, I should say,
sometimes even if you read a newspaper article, they might say something like, "It is a criminal
offense in the UK to do this and this." Whereas actually what they normally mean is England and
Wales. Scotland has their own legal system completely, they have their own court system, they
have their own criminal laws. What we study together is the law of England and Wales. One of the
most distinctive features of criminal law in England and Wales is that we do not have a criminal
code or a penal code. I've given you here on the screen a few examples of a penal code. The
German criminal code, the Pakistan penal code. If you were in Germany or in Pakistan and you
wanted to look for a definition of murder, what you would do is you go to the criminal code, you find
the relevant section and you read it. This is unfortunately for you, who are starting your studies, not
the case in England and Wales. If you want to find a definition of murder, what you must do is look
up this man on the screen, Sir Edward Coke, and the old definition of murder we still get from his

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early definition. England and Wales does not have a central penal code but it is largely based on
common law.
One of the questions that we had on the VLE before the induction was what then is the status of
draft criminal code? In the 1980s, the Law Commission thought maybe we should be drafting a
criminal code in England and Wales, and they drafted this document which is called Draft Criminal
Code. This document was never enacted so it doesn't have any sort of an official position in the
criminal justice system. You can sometimes see it referred to in case of causation or something
that courts can look at or more often academics look at, but it doesn't have any sort of a legal
position in the criminal justice system. It's just a sort of general thinking that what could have
happened but never really happened.
Then, students, when you are starting to look for your criminal law, it does mean that you need to
look very broadly. You do not have a central criminal code to go to, but rather, you need to go to
common law, you need to look at a whole range of cases, you need to look at statutes as well. Still
criminal law largely is common law. All the way up till the 19th century all of criminal law was
common law. Then in the 20th century, there were increasingly more statutes created and now
when a new offense comes about it always comes as a statute. Still, it means that these really
important areas of criminal law like mens rea, actus reus, causation, homicide, all of these things
we go to common law for.
This then means that we do study an incredible volume of cases. This is something that I have to
say that a lot of students do not love. A lot of people like criminal law but they don't like the volume
of cases. There's really no way around it because cases are the sources of criminal law, they're the
main source of criminal law. There's really no way around learning the cases because simply they
are the law. Later in the presentation, I'll show you a little bit about how I think it's a useful way to
think about those cases and structure them because they still remain the main source of criminal
law today.
Then, in this course, we follow, I suppose in some ways, quite a traditional criminal law syllabus.
We start with what I call the building blocks of criminal liability. The first weeks of your studies you
might have already looked at the VLE. If you haven't, hopefully you'll look at it soon. You'll start
with thinking about actus reus and mens rea. These are the mental element and the physical
elements of the crimes. Really starting to think about those building blocks and how criminal
liability functions. Then once you've mastered that you move on to think about specific crimes.
Then this part B, or part 2, the specific crimes, this is the biggest part of the course and this is what
you'll spend most of your time on, in this year. In this part, you'll study things like homicide, you'll
study sexual offenses, you'll study offense against a person, property offenses, and also defenses.
This will be the majority of your studies for the year. Then, in the final part of the course, you'll look
into attempts and participation. Attempt is when a person attempts to commit a crime but they don't
quite succeed, thinking about where that liability begins and ends. Then participation is where you
have more than one person who might be liable for a crime. If you're thinking about how far those
people then would be liable. If they didn't commit the crime but they assisted in commission of the
crime, how much liability would they have. This is the broad structure for the year, starting from the
building blocks, then really thinking about various different offenses. Then, finally, thinking about
attempts and participation.
One of the questions on the VLE that we had was about how do we then prepare, how do we
approach the materials. We have a lot of materials that we can study. What is the best way to go
about tackling the textbook, the VLE, the further reading? What I've tried to do here is give you a
bit of a roadmap into how to approach all the materials that you have. I think the first and the best
place to always, always start from is the VLE.
In the VLE you have these concise explanations of all the important aspects of your studies. It has
a volume of exercises; exercises of very different kinds. Those exercises will allow you to test your

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knowledge on one hand, but it also allows you to deepen your knowledge. I think VLE is always the
first place where you should start off from. Then you use the textbook. I've given you the textbook
here on the screen, the textbook is Criminal Law by William Wilson. Then you use the textbook to
deepen your knowledge. Then, sometimes, you'll find that on the VLE, that you will have these
exercises that refer to the textbook. You can keep them sort of side by side but starting with the
VLE. You can access the textbook through the online library as well. You can sort of have it there
handy when you need it to be just on your laptop. These two are really your core materials.
There are further reading references both on the VLE as well as in the book, and you might want to
look into those. Actually, the textbook that you have, this book of Criminal Law, is incredibly in-
depth. It's one of the most in-depth and better textbooks, I would like to say, in the market. If you
are finding yourself that you've read the textbook and you don't have any energy to look any
further, that's fine because the textbook actually gives you that analytical focus that you would
want to have anyway. These two are your core materials. Always the VLE is your priority, is your
starting point, deepening your knowledge from the textbook.
Then, what I would really recommend that everyone does is then spend a little bit of time with case
law. I mentioned before that criminal law has quite a big volume of cases, so it would be good to
get in the habit of reading, creating flashcards, or creating mind maps or something of that kind on
cases, so they're easily accessible for you. I'll say next what I mean by that. Then, the final step in
this journey is to consolidate your notes. You looked at the VLE, you read your textbook, you have
your notes from your cases, then just make sure all your notes are in a nice and coherent way.
Then, you can also have a look at the past exam papers that are all available on VLE and see how
was this topic assessed before. If you do all these four steps for every single topic, come April,
your revision will be a breeze. I would really recommend a really good note-taking and really good
consolidation of notes at the end of each study chapter.
I just wanted to share this very quickly. This is a note of how you might be taking case notes. One
of the things in criminal law is that we have quite a lot of cases, but you don't need to read these
cases in full. For the vast majority of cases that you read and you come across, the only thing you
need to know is why is this case legally important and why have you been asked to read this case.
When you're making notes, I've given you examples with exactly the same information but two
different ways here. Always make a note of the brief facts of the case, make a note of what is the
legal importance of that case, and then make a note of if there's something that is really important
about that case that you need to remember, like a test that is set for the future, a change of some
kind, highlight that for yourself. If you have these three things; the facts, the ratio, and what I call
the golden nugget, that's all you need for all the cases that you study.
I've given the same information here in two different formats because I think what would be helpful
for everyone at this point is to learn how you learn the best. Some people are incredibly visual,
they prefer colors, they prefer pictures, then you use that visual aspect of yourself and create your
notes in a way that works for you. Some people don't care about pictures, they don't care about
colors, and you can stick to a more traditional format. Play around and find a way to work with
cases that work for you.
This is the very last thing I want to say, and then we move on to any questions that you have. The
last thing I want to say is just about how is this course then assessed. There is a chance for you to
practice, which is the formative feedback, we call it the tutor feedback. In the year there will be an
opportunity for you to submit an answer to a past exam question and to practice, that's called the
tutor feedback. The mark from there is purely for you, for you to improve, the same for the
feedback. Then how the course is actually assessed is by summative assessment, which is a
100% exam at the end of the course.
For criminal law, you have to answer four questions in the exam. There is a part 1 for the exam,
which is an unseen problem question. That is a problem question with a number of little questions

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underneath that you need to answer. Everyone has to answer that particular question. Then you
have part 2, and that is a collection of essays and problem questions. Out of those, you need to
answer three questions. Altogether, it's four questions you need to answer in the exam,
compulsory problem question, as well as in a mixture of essays and problems.
This is then my last slide, and this is also something that someone asked on the VLE before we got
started. I said that the exam is a collection of essays and problems. This is a very traditional way, I
suppose, of assessing criminal law, but it's also a traditional way of learning criminal law. As you're
working through your materials on the VLE, you will find that there are a series of problem
questions already there, and you will find that there's a series of essay questions too. Both the
problems and the essays are something that you can practice throughout the year as you're
working through the materials on the VLE.
The problem questions are quite unique, I suppose, to study of law, and particularly common law
areas, like conduct law and criminal law, in that here we are really testing your knowledge of
application of the law. It's not so much about critical thinking, but it's finding a lawyer mindset, I
say. You're really thinking about this in terms of advising a client, trying to find guilt, really applying
the law to the current scenario.
Someone asked on the VLE would the IRAC method be useful here. Something that some people
would have learned in contract. The answer is yes. The IRAC method stands for Issue, Rule,
Application, and Conclusion. There should be materials on the VLE where you can look more into
the IRAC method. This is a really good way of approaching any problem question that you ever
come across in criminal law. Identify the issue, explain what the rule is, apply the law, and then
conclude, and that's it.
That's problem questions, really that lawyer mindset, finding guilt, thinking about application. Then,
another thing that you'll come across a lot on the VLE and in the exam is essays. Essays are
different from problem questions because these are really looking for knowledge again. Knowledge
is the core of everything. It's more looking at the critical analysis. It's looking at critical analysis of
law and the context. We're not trying to apply the law, but we're trying to think, is the law fair?
Should the law be reformed? Does the law work? We're asking very different kinds of questions in
the essays. In a way, essays are giving you that academic mindset rather than the lawyer mindset.
That is it for my induction. I see that we have a few questions already. I'm just going to have a look
at the questions that we have here. If you have any questions at all, this is your time to shine. Ask
your questions, whatever those questions are. There are no silly questions at all. Put your
questions in the chat.
I am going to start with a question from Rhythm, who asks, "In answering essay questions, do we
assume an academic audience?" This is actually a really, really good question. I think the best way
to say that is do not assume anything. Obviously, whoever is going to be reading your exam is
going to be an experienced lecturer, marker in criminal law. You shouldn't think that they are. You
always start with explaining the law clearly. Take any essay question as an opportunity for you to
show how much about the law and how much can you critically discuss it. Stay focused on the
question, but do not assume anything, but rather start with explaining the law always when it
comes to essay questions.
The question is, "Would 500 to 800 words be sufficient for each question in part 1 and part 2?" In
the first place, this is a good question, but it's quite a tricky question to answer about the word
count. When it comes to part 1 of the assessment, you have this problem question, a traditional
problem question, but it's followed by about 10 different sub-questions. Most of those you can
answer really quickly as one line, then some of them require a bit more application. Word count is
not really essential so much. Thinking about the word count is secondary, I think, for the part 1. It's
really a question of answering all those sub-questions.

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Then, when it comes to the questions in part B, I think an answer between 500 and 800 words
should definitely be sufficient for all the questions in part 1 and 2. If you're in that bracket, you are
definitely covering a good amount of count there.
"Will there be a Lecture Plus for this lecture?" There's no Lecture Plus this year, but you can also
find a lot of the old Lecture Plus lectures on the VLE already. If you want to hear more of me, you
will hear me talking through some of the previous Lecture Plus sessions there.
We have another question who asks, "What is the best source for looking up definitions of crime?
The Parliament glossary or Westlaw?" I'm going to give you perhaps a surprising answer here,
which is your VLE or your textbook. There isn't a central definition booklet of what criminal law is.
Because we don't have that penal code, the Parliament actually doesn't have that clear definition
either. When you're finding definitions, actually the textbooks end up being the most authoritative
places where even lawyers, even judges go to some textbooks in their definitions of it. When you
are looking at those definitions, you can actually just stick to the materials that you have and those
will be authoritative. If you are looking at a statute, if you're looking at a criminal offense that is a
statutory offense, then you can go and there is a website that has all the statutes there, you can
read them up. When it comes to those old common law offenses, you can just stick to materials in
the VLE and in the textbook.
Yona is asking, "Will there be a tutor feedback activity?". You can actually find on the VLE tutor
feedback activity that we recently did for the students the previous year. You can also use that.
You can look at some of the old tutor feedback activity questions, practice them yourself, and then
have a look at the marker's comments to see, check yourself if you want to start practising quite
early on.
We have another question here about the assessments and how does it work. Each question in the
exam has the same weighting. Your mark for the exam will be the average of four. You will get a
mark, each of the questions are marked independently and then your mark for the module will be
the average of the four marks.
Then we have a question from Kimberley who was asking about referencing cases. "If you don't
know the case name, what's the best way to indicate knowledge?" This would be a question, I
suppose, if you're in a closed book environment, if you're in a closed book environment, then if you
just say the pre-facts of the case, then the examiner will know what you are talking about. In most
cases, you might have materials at your disposal that allow you to check on those.
What's the website to find the statute? There is some government's own website for statute, it's
called legislation.gov.uk. If you go to the website, if you just google legislation UK, that's the
website and you'll find all the statutes there.
In terms of finding cases, again your VLE has quite a good summary of things. For cases I always
recommend students to use Lexis+ and Westlaw. These are the two main legal databases, you
can access both through library. If I'm entirely honest, there is also a wealth of materials online.
There are resources such as E-lawresources. They're not always the most authoritative, there
might be some mistakes, but there are other materials online that are easily available just by
googling them. The best and most authoritative places are always Westlaw and Lexis+.
Pretty much discussed about subsections mentioned in the statute book for 11 subsections for
course syllabus. There are certain crimes that you will study that are very detailed, and for those
subsections, will be relevant, but you'll understand it from the reading of the materials on the VLE
and the textbook. You'll get to know what is the really important bit, what is not the really important
bit. In any case, whatever format exams take, you can always take the bare minimum, a statute
book with you. You never need to memorize learnings of the statutes in full. It's important that you
learn how to use those use legislation and to read legislation, which can be quite tricky in the early
days.

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Student is asking, "Is the recommended blog for criminal law?" We have this central blog in the
University of London. This is the University of London blogs. There are quite a few blogs going
back many years on all the core models that you might be studying at this point by the model
conveners. I do a blog a year on the criminal law issues and there's a new blog coming up any
day. I think I owe a blog now. There will be a new blog coming up in the next few weeks on
corporate manslaughter that I'm just about to finish and send off. We do have a central blog where
all the model conveners post some thoughts. I don't have any other recommendations in terms of
blogs.
There's a question about accessing resources. "Do we have access to Lexis+ as students?" Yes. If
you go to the University of London Online Library. The library is absolutely fantastic. We have the
library, there are resources for law students. Also, the librarian has created these wonderful
resources on how to use the online library as a law student. You can have a look at those training
resources of how do you access different kinds of databases? How do you look for a case in a
database? There are all these things in the online library. If you head to the University of London
library, you need to be registered as a student and then you can find all those training resources.
You can find links to Lexis+, you can find links to Westlaw, as well as other materials.
I should say the library induction and the materials that the library has created are genuinely
fantastic. I looked at them myself and they are very, very good resources. If you haven't had a
chance to really look at those materials that the library has done, please do because they can be
really helpful to you. It can be helpful whatever stage of your studies you are. Some of you are
here for the first year, some of you are second year. I say even final-year students who are looking
at their dissertations, the materials in the library, the materials the librarian has created are truly
fantastic. I recommend everyone to have a look. Then you can find all sorts of materials through
Westlaw and Lexis+ that are relevant to law.
Thank you very much, everyone, for attending. Thank you for all your questions. I very much hope
that you will enjoy studying criminal law this year. I hope you find everything on the VLE, very
informative. Thank you very much for joining us today.

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