Murder (south africa)

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As murder ( English murder ) is referred to in the Law of South Africa , the intentional killing .

Definition and demarcation

The South African criminal law distinguishes the homicides comparatively coarse in intentional killing (murder) and manslaughter ( culpable homicide ) and continues to the extent of both the English ( murder and voluntary manslaughter / involuntary manslaughter ) and from the US ( first / second degree murder and voluntary manslaughter ) systematics. In the tradition of Roman-Dutch law, the murder thus encompasses the classic case of killing with premeditation as well as cases in which the killing was only foreseeable.

suicide

According to the judgment of the Appellate Division in Ex parte Die Minister van Justisie: In re S v Grotjohn (1970 (2) SA 355 (A)), suicide is not a criminal offense in South Africa. Aid (accessory) to this is still punishable as murder or culpable homicide .

punishment

From 1917 to 1935 murder was subject to the mandatory death penalty . In 1935 s. 61 (a) of the General Law Amendment Act (46 of 1935) abandoned this restrictive provision and gave the judge the discretion to impose a lower sentence in "extenuating circumstances"; from 1990 this discretion was unrestricted. In 1995 the Constitutional Court in S v. Makwanyane (1995 (3) SA 291 (CC)) made the death penalty generally unconstitutional. The execution had already been suspended.

The minimum sentence, without taking mitigating circumstances into account, is 15 years imprisonment for first-time offenders.

literature

  • Jonathan Burchell: South Africa . In: Kevin Heller, Markus Dubber (Eds.): The Handbook of Comparative Criminal Law . 4th edition. Stanford University Press, 2010, ISBN 978-0-8047-7729-2 , pp. 473-477 .
  • CG Van der Merwe, JE Du Plessis: Introduction to the law of South Africa . Kluwer Law International, 2004, ISBN 978-90-411-2282-7 , pp. 469-472 .
  • CR Snyman: Criminal Law . 5th edition. Butterworths LexisNexis, Pretoria 2002.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c C. G. Van der Merwe, JE Du Plessis: Introduction to the law of South Africa . Kluwer Law International, 2004, p. 469-472 .
  2. ^ Mandatory Sentences of Imprisonment in Common Law Jurisdictions: Some Representative Models. Department of Justice. Retrieved June 15, 2016.