In criminal law, a conspiracy is an agreement between two or more people to commit a crime at some time in the future. Criminal law in some countries or for some conspiracies may require that at least one overt act be undertaken in furtherance of that agreement to constitute an offense. There is no limit to the number participating in the conspiracy, and in most countries the plan itself is the crime, so there is no requirement that any steps have been taken to put the plan into effect (compare attempts which require proximity to the full offense).
For the purposes of concurrence, the actus reus is a continuing one and parties may join the plot later and incur joint liability and conspiracy can be charged where the co-conspirators have been acquitted or cannot be traced. Finally, repentance by one or more parties does not affect liability (unless, in some cases, it occurs before the parties have committed overt acts) but may reduce their sentence.
An unindicted co-conspirator, or unindicted conspirator, is a person or entity that is alleged in an indictment to have engaged in conspiracy but who is not charged in the same indictment. Prosecutors choose to name persons as unindicted co-conspirators for a variety of reasons including grants of immunity, pragmatic considerations, and evidentiary concerns.
England and Wales
Common law offence At common law, the crime of conspiracy was capable of infinite growth, able to accommodate any new situation and to criminalize it if the level of threat to society was sufficiently great. The courts were therefore acting in the role of the legislature to create new offences and, following the Law Commission Report No. 76 on Conspiracy and Criminal Law Reform,Report on Conspiracy and Criminal Law Reform EWLC 76 (1 January 1976) the Criminal Law Act 1977 produced a statutory offence and abolished all the common law varieties of conspiracy, except two: that of conspiracy to defraud, and that of conspiracy to corrupt public morals or to outrage public decency.
Conspiracy to defraud
Section 5(2) of the Criminal Law Act 1977 preserved the common law offence of conspiracy to defraud. Conspiracy to defraud was defined in Scott v Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis per Viscount Dilhorne:Scott v Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis (1974) UKHL 4; AC 819, 839
Conspiracy to corrupt public morals or to outrage public decency Section 5(3) Criminal Law Act 1977 preserved the common law offence of conspiracy to corrupt public morals or of conspiracy to outrage public decency. These are offences under the common law of England and Wales.Specifically: Conspiracy to corrupt public morals: Shaw v Director of Public Prosecutions AC 220, 2 WLR 897, 2 All ER 446, 125 JP 437, 105 Sol Jo 421, 45 Cr App R 113, HL; Knuller (Publishing, Printing and Promotions) Ltd v Director of Public Prosecutions AC 435, 3 WLR 143, 2 All ER 898, 136 JP 728, 116 Sol Jo 545, 56 Cr App R 633, HL Conspiracy to outrage public decency: Knuller (Publishing, Printing and Promotions) Ltd v Director of Public Prosecutions ; AC 435, 3 WLR 143, 2 All ER 898, 136 JP 728, 116 Sol Jo 545, 56 Cr App R 633, HL (Lords Diplock and Reid dissenting)
Section 5(1) of the Criminal Law Act 1977 does not affect the common law offence of conspiracy if, and in so far as, it can be committed by entering into an agreement to engage in conduct which tends to corrupt public morals, or which outrages public decency, but which does not amount to or involve the commission of an offence if carried out by a single person otherwise than in pursuance of an agreement. One authority maintains that conspiracy to "corrupt public morals" has no definitive case law, that it is unknown whether or not it is a substantive offence, and that it is unlikely that conspirators will be prosecuted for this offence.
These two offences cover situations where, for example, a publisher encourages immoral behaviour through explicit content in a magazine or periodical, as in the 1970 case of Knuller (Publishing, Printing and Promotions) Ltd v Director of Public Prosecutions, which ultimately was decided in 1973 by the House of Lords. In the 1991 case of R v Rowley,R v Rowley, 4 All ER 649 the defendant left notes in public places over a period of three weeks offering money and presents to boys with the intention of luring them for immoral purposes, but there was nothing lewd, obscene or disgusting in the notes, nor were they printed by a news magazine at the behest of Rowley, which would have invoked the element of conspiracy. The judge ruled that the jury was entitled to look at the purpose behind the notes in deciding whether they were lewd or disgusting. On appeal against conviction, it was held that an act outraging public decency required a deliberate act which was in itself lewd, obscene or disgusting, so Rowley's motive in leaving the notes was irrelevant and, since there was nothing in the notes themselves capable of outraging public decency, the conviction was quashed.
Statutory offence
This offence was created as a result of the Law Commission's recommendations in their Report, Conspiracy and Criminal Law Reform, 1976, Law Com No 76. This was part of the commission's programme of codification of the criminal law. The eventual aim was to abolish all the remaining common law offences and replace them, where appropriate, with offences precisely defined by statute. The common law offences were seen as unacceptably vague and open to development by the courts in ways which might offend the principle of certainty. There was an additional problem that it could be a criminal conspiracy at common law to engage in conduct which was not in itself a criminal offence: see Law Com No 76, para 1.7. This was a major mischief at which the 1977 Act was aimed, although it retained the convenient concept of a common law conspiracy to defraud: see Law Com No 76, paras 1.9 and 1.16. Henceforward, according to the Law Commission, it would only be an offence to agree to engage in a course of conduct which was itself a criminal offence.
Section 1(1) of the Criminal Law Act 1977 provides:
Section 1A (inserted by the Criminal Justice (Terrorism and Conspiracy) Act 1998, s. 5) bans conspiracies part of which occurred in England and Wales to commit an act or the happening of some other event outside the United Kingdom which constitutes an offence under the law in force in that country or territory. Many conditions apply including that prosecutions need consent from the Attorney General for England and Wales.
Exceptions Under section 2(1) the intended victim of the offence cannot be guilty of conspiracy. Under section 2(2) there can be no conspiracy where the only other person(s) to the agreement are:
Mens rea There must be an agreement between two or more persons. The mens rea of conspiracy is a separate issue from the mens rea required of the substantive crime. Lord Bridge in R v Anderson, quoted in R v Hussain, said:
Lord Bridge in R v Anderson also said:
It is not therefore necessary for any action to be taken in furtherance of the criminal purpose in order for a conspiracy offence to have been committed. This distinguishes a conspiracy from an attempt (which necessarily does involve a person doing an act): see Criminal Attempts Act 1981.
Things said or done by one conspirator Adrian Keane in The Modern Law of Evidence, quoted approvingly by Lord Steyn in R v Hayter, wrote:
History According to Edward Coke, conspiracy was originally a statutory remedy against false accusation and prosecution by "a consultation and agreement between two or more to appeal or indict an innocent man falsely and maliciously of felony, whom they cause to be indicted and appealed; and afterward the party is lawfully acquitted". In Poulterer's Case, 77 Eng. Rep. 813 (K.B. 1611), the court reasoned that the thrust of the crime was the confederating of two or more, and dropped the requirement that an actual indictment of an innocent take place, whereby precedent was set that conspiracy only need involve an attempted crime, and that the agreement was the act, which enabled subsequent holdings against an agreement to commit any crime, not just that originally proscribed.
Conspiracy to trespass In Kamara v Director of Public Prosecutions,Kamara v Director of Public Prosecutions AC 104, 3 WLR 198, 2 All ER 1242, 117 Sol Jo 581, 57 Cr App R 880, HL nine students, who were nationals of Sierra Leone, appealed their convictions for conspiracy to trespass, and unlawful assembly. These persons, together with others who did not appeal, conspired to occupy the London premises of the High Commissioner for Sierra Leone in order to publicize grievances against the government of that country. Upon their arrival at the commission, they threatened the caretaker with an imitation firearm and locked him in a reception room with ten other members of the staff. The students then held a press conference on the telephone, but the caretaker was able to contact the police, who arrived, released the prisoners, and arrested the accused. In this case the Court felt that the public interest was clearly involved because of the statutory duty of the British Government to protect diplomatic premises. Lauton J delivered the judgment of the Court of Appeal dismissing the appeal from conviction.
Conspiracy to corrupt public morals and conspiracy to outrage public decency
These offences were at one time tied up with prostitution and homosexual behaviour. After the Second World War, due to the fame of several convicts, the Wolfenden report was commissioned by government, and was published in 1957. Thereupon came the publication of several books, both pro and contra the report. Of these books we can isolate two representatives: Lord Devlin wrote in favour of societal norms, or morals, while H. L. A. Hart wrote that the state could ill regulate private conduct. In May 1965, Devlin is reported to have conceded defeat.
The Street Offences Act 1959 prohibited England's prostitutes from soliciting in the streets. One Shaw published a booklet containing prostitutes' names and addresses; each woman listed had paid Shaw for her advertisement. A 1962 majority in the House of Lords not only found the appellant guilty of a statutory offence (living on the earnings of prostitution), but also of the "common law misdemeanour of conspiracy to corrupt public morals".Shaw v DPP AC 220 (HL).
In the case of Knuller (Publishing, Printing and Promotions) Ltd v DPP, which was decided in 1973 in the House of Lords,Knuller (Publishing, Printing and Promotions) Ltd v DPP 2 All E.R. 898 (HL) and 435 AC the appellants were directors of a company which published a fortnightly magazine. On an inside page under a column headed "Males" advertisements were inserted inviting readers to meet the advertisers for the purpose of homosexual practices. The appellants were convicted on counts of
conspiracy to corrupt public morals, and conspiracy to outrage public decency.
The appeal on count 1 was dismissed, while the appeal on count 2 was allowed because in the present case there had been a misdirection in relation to the meaning of "decency" and the offence of "outrage". The list of cases consulted in the ratio decidendi is lengthy, and the case of Shaw v DPP is a topic of furious discussion.
Conspiracy to effect a public mischief In Withers v Director of Public Prosecutions,Withers v DPP 3 WLR 751, HL which reached the House of Lords in 1974, it was unanimously held that conspiracy to effect a public mischief was not a separate and distinct class of criminal conspiracy. This overruled earlier decisions to the contrary effect. The Law Commission published a consultation paper on this subject in 1975.The Law Commission. "Codification of the Criminal Law: Conspiracies to effect a public mischief and to commit a civil wrong". Working Paper No 63. 1975. para. 4 to 30
Conspiracy to murder