The principle of guilt in English criminal law

Abstract

The author of this article takes up the challenge of presenting the issue of guilt under English criminal law. He provides a historical outline of the regulation of the development of English criminal law and divides it into three stages: from the Norse invasions in the fifth century to the middle of the twelfth century, the second covering the period from the middle of the twelfth century to the second quarter of the nineteenth century, which he qualifies as the formative period of English criminal law, and the third stage, the contemporary one from the middle of the nineteenth century to the present. The author describes the formation of the principle of guilt over the centuries and tries to indicate the direction in which the regulation of the principle of guilt is heading.