Moralni prestup i krivično djelo
Moral Wrong and Crime

Summary/Abstract: The relationship between criminal law and morality is multi-layered and complex. This relationship is marked by the relationship between criminal and moral wrong, which this paper deals with. Its goal is to perceive and analyze the similarities and differences between a crime and a moral offense. This could contribute to answering the question of whether, and to what extent, it is justified to take into account moral norms when creating and applying criminal law. The conclusion that the legislator should take into account the moral norms when prescribing criminal law norms, does not imply abandoning the basic criterion for creation of criminal offences, which are the object of criminal law protection and the degree of its endangerment. Moral norms can contribute to giving a complex assessment of the significance of that object and its endangerment, but they do not by themselves provide an answer to the question of the need to criminalize certain behavior. When applying the law, courts should not assess whether a crime is at the same time a moral offense. Except for a small number of criminal offenses where their legal description in some way requires certain moral evaluations in determining whether an essential element of crime exists, this issue should be irrelevant to the court. Courts should not, especially in the case of sentencing (which is sometimes difficult to avoid), take into account whether and to what extent the committed crime provoked moral condemnation, as this is not a circumstance that should affect the sentence. Also, the absence of moral condemnation, if all the conditions for the existence of a criminal offense in a particular case have been met, has no significance for the court in the application of law.

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