In criminal law, an offence against the person usually refers to a crime which is committed by direct physical harm or force being applied to another person.
They are usually analysed by division into the following categories:
- Fatal offences
- Sexual offences
- Non-fatal non-sexual offences
They can be further analysed by division into:
- Assaults
- Injuries
And it is then possible to consider degrees and aggravations, and distinguish between intentional actions (e.g., assault) and criminal negligence (e.g., criminal endangerment).
Offences against the person are usually taken to comprise:
- Fatal offences
- Murder
- Manslaughter
- Non-fatal non-sexual offences
- Assault, or common assault
- Battery, or common battery
- Wounding or wounding with intent
- Poisoning
- Assault occasioning actual bodily harm (and derivative offences)
- Inflicting grievous bodily harm or causing grievous bodily harm with intent (and derivative offences)
The crimes are usually grouped together in common law countries as a legacy of the Offences against the Person Act 1861.
Although most sexual offences will also be offences against the person, for various reasons (including sentencing and registration of offenders) sexual crimes are usually categorised separately. Similarly, although many homicides also involve an offence against the person, they are usually categorised under the more serious category.
Famous quotes containing the words offence against, offence and/or person:
“A kind of Pythagorean terror, as though the irrationality of pi were an offence against the deity, not to mention his creature.”
—Samuel Beckett (1906–1989)
“It breedeth no small offence and scandal to see and consider upon the one part the curiosity and cost bestowed by all sorts of men upon their private houses; and on the other part the unclean and negligent order and spare keeping of the houses of prayer by permitting open decays and ruins of coverings of walls and windows, and by appointing unmeet and unseemly tables with foul cloths for the communion of the sacrament.”
—Elizabeth I (1533–1603)
“There is no way to face the great advantages of another person than through love.”
—Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749–1832)