Similar Felony and Mistake in Crime against Human Body in Islamic Penal Code of 2013

Abstract

The word"Similar" in crimes agains human body first was used in Article 290 of Islamic Pneal Code of 2013 of Iran and has no background in Fiqh (Islamic rules) and previous laws. Having no legal-Fiqhi background, this word has caused many ambiguities; at first glance it seems that this word has increased the scope of intentional crimes against human body and obscured the boundaries of mistake in such crimes. Through the paper, using a descriptive-analytical method, authors have reached to this result that “similar felony” in crimes against human body only includes crimes committed to unwanted limbs of a wanted victim with similar or lower consequences than offender’s intention and it excludes unwanted crime against an unwanted victim. Such crimes sometimes are inherently intentional and sometimes supposedly. However it is necessary that legislator amends this ambiguous word and enacts a specific article to elaborately expresses that mistake in committing crime to unwanted limb of a victim in an intentional crime which leads to similar or lower consequences than offender’s intention to other limb, would be intentional.

Keywords

• felony
• similar
• homicide
• intentional
• mistake