[comp.admin.policy] *Legal* obligation to report a crime

kadie@m.cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie) (06/15/91)

karl.kleinpaste@osc.edu writes:
[...]
>Anyone who witnesses a crime and does nothing to stop it is a party to
>it.  In fact, screwed up though the USA legal system surely is, it
>makes a lot of sense that certain crimes are defined in terms of the
>failure _of_the_citizenry_ to report other crimes.
[...]

I won't address the original question or the moral quesiton, just this
legal question.

In general, a citzen is under no legal obligation to report a crime.
The only exceptions I can think of involve child abuse and doctors.

- Carl
-- 
Carl Kadie -- kadie@cs.uiuc.edu -- University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

karl.kleinpaste@osc.edu (06/17/91)

karl.kleinpaste@osc.edu writes:
   >Anyone who witnesses a crime and does nothing to stop it is a party to
   >it.  In fact, screwed up though the USA legal system surely is, it
   >makes a lot of sense that certain crimes are defined in terms of the
   >failure _of_the_citizenry_ to report other crimes.

kadie@m.cs.uiuc.edu writes:
   In general, a citzen is under no legal obligation to report a crime.
   The only exceptions I can think of involve child abuse and doctors.

I did not say anything about the general case, and quite specifically
mentioned "certain crimes"; having spent several years as a foster
parent, child abuse was the primary example on my mind at the time of
that writing.

--karl