Understanding Criminal Act Stages and Attempted Crimes
Unit 22: Degrees of Performing a Crime
Successive Steps in the Consummation of a Crime
The commission of an offense is displayed in a general process that consists of stages, from the purely subjective to the full implementation of the action described by law.
Internal Phase: Ideation, Deliberation, Resolution
The internal phase comprises the ideation process, deliberation, and resolution to do the criminal act that occurs in the psyche of the agent. The crime remains without exceeding the inner stage, as the author has not taken “steps” that have transcended their own psychic sphere.
External Phase: Preparatory Acts
The external phase includes preparatory acts, executive acts or attempts, the offense itself, and the exhausted crime. The external stage begins with preparation. In it, the author seeks the instruments with which they intend to carry out the crime or is placed in a position to perpetrate it.
The Attempt of a Crime
An attempt is the attempt of a crime that stops at a point in its development before reaching the degree of completion, i.e., before it has completed the action as typical. According to article 42 of the Criminal Procedure, the author of an attempt is “one who, in order to commit a particular offense, starts running it but does not consume it due to circumstances beyond their control.”
Theories of Attempt
- Objective Theory: According to this theory, the attempt is punished due to the danger to the legally protected interest. It is the traditional view that has been accepted by our doctrine.
- Subjective Theory: While recognizing that the attempt requires an objective manifestation, this theory punishes it because the author acted intentionally, that is, they expressed their will contrary to the law. Obviously, the first principle would not include in the attempt the call attempt or impossible offense (in which the legally protected interest may not have been in danger), and the second would not lead to the punishment of the attempt with less intensity than the offense, because the fraud would be the same in both, whichever place on the punishment to the attempted calls unrealistic.
Theories Distinguishing Executive Acts
- Objective Tendency: This is now predominant in the literature. For this theory, executive acts are those involving the beginning of the typical run, i.e., performing an activity that is already within the description of the crime, in the words of its main verb.
- Subjective-Objective Tendency: According to this theory, it is enough that the author acts in a way relevant to the criminal activities that guide them, though not initially involving the same type of conduct. That is, the concept of executive action runs, covering some that in the above theory are only preparatory.
Attempted Crime and Frustrated Crime
Attempted Offense (Unfinished Attempt)
An attempted offense is understood as one in which the author has not completed all the activity (or course of omission) that the process of consummation requires and, therefore, allows the person to be arrested voluntarily by them. (E.g., the author who intends to steal with scaling has penetrated the place where the thing is but, before taking it, decides to stop their activity.)
Frustrated Crime (Finished Attempt)
A frustrated crime is understood as one in which the author has done all the activity to do or complete the failure for the consummation to occur. Despite this, it does not occur because of circumstances beyond one’s will, not getting to produce the attack legally recognized by the type (that does not become violated or the danger does not arise as typically required by it).
Abandonment
Abandonment is the voluntary, definitive, and timely purpose of committing the crime by the author. Abandonment is voluntary, as it proceeds from the same author, without relying on objective circumstances, or even subjective ones, that hinder the progress of its implementation, nor is it implicitly or explicitly imposed. It is final when the author has decided to abandon entirely the criminal route chosen to achieve what was intended and not simply replace one of the same character or postpone or suspend it, waiting for better circumstances. It is appropriate when the abandonment of the execution has become the case, impairment of the consummation.
The effect of absolving excuse is personal; the penalty is released from the author’s attempt, not the attempt. Impunity means giving up the attempt of the crime, but not the crimes already consummated by the author: if the author has already injured the victim and voluntarily gives up killing them, they are not subject to a penalty for attempted murder but for injury.