"Criminal Strict Liability" – Explained Simply

What is “Criminal Strict Liability”?

Although we might not know it by its name, every one of us is already familiar with criminal strict liability. We see it all around us every day. Examples include the criminal laws against --

Having sex with a minor (statutory rape).
Drunk driving.
Selling spoiled food.
Selling alcohol to a minor.
Violating workplace safety standards.

These are all strict liability crimes. They focus on just one thing: the illegal act itself. Do that thing, go to jail. A criminal strict liability law says --

It doesn’t matter how good your intentions were.
We are not interested in what you thought you were doing when you did this.
It makes no difference how hard you tried to keep this from happening.

Criminal strict liability laws are aimed at conduct that’s intolerable. Do it and there are no excuses. Do it and you go to jail.

That’s strict.

Strict Liability Criminal Statutes in the United States

Most crimes require a combination of act plus mental state. For example, if a person does something that causes a human to die, the crime could be first degree murder if it was planned ahead of time, second degree murder if it resulted from reckless disregard of the possibility that death could result, or simple homicide if it happened because of negligence.

That’s not true of strict liability crimes. Technically speaking, strict liability offenses are crimes that do not require proof of the defendant’s mental state (mens rea). Society is not interested in what you were thinking, what you intended, etc. It doesn't even matter whether you knew there was a law against doing what you did.

The "Criminal Strict Liability" definition and examples were written by dog bite attorney Kenneth Phillips of dogbitelaw.com. As a wonderful courtesy, we have permission from Phillips to publish this definition on our website. "Strict liability" is a concept that more commonly relates to civil law.

In 2022, two pit bulls killed 88-year old Mary Gehring and injured a young boy in Golden, Colorado. Prosecutors charged the owners with owning a dangerous dog causing death, a class 5 felony. Under the Colorado Revised Statute 18-9-204.5, Unlawful Ownership of a Dangerous Dog, is a strict liability crime. Both owners, Kayla Mooney and Victor Bentley, pleaded guilty. Other than this case, we do not believe we have seen a "criminal strict liability" felony statute applicable to a fatal dog mauling.

In Michigan and Washington, felony dog attack statutes have been tested by prosecutors who inferred the legislative intent was a strict liability offense because the statute was silent on criminal intent. In both cases, appellate courts rejected: People of Mi v. Janes and State v. Bash. The dissenters in Bash wrote: "The majority attempts to convert this into a 'second bite' statute, but Mr. Walt Freser was killed by the attack of the dogs. Surely the majority did not wish to make this a 'second death' statute."