Ignorance Of Law Case Study

1 Introduction

The liability of an accused, with regards to mens rea in the form of intention, requires the existence of intention with regards to every aspect of the crime. Unlawfulness is a critical part of every crime, and thus knowledge of unlawfulness is, if the principles of logic are used, a prerequisite of liability. It is from this logical presumption from which the defence of ignorance of the law arose. It is a defence that does not have much of a legal standing in Western legal dispensations, where the crime levels are fairly low, but in South Africa, with its high levels of crime, the rule of ignorance of the law is “[one of the] most lenient, liberal [and] criminal friendly” rules in the world. In this essay, I shall compare the South African approach to ignorance of the law to those of our western counterparts, and assess Snyman’s criticism of the rule and whether the application of the rule amounts to being “criminal friendly”.

2 International approach

The general approach abroad follows the English Law maxim of ignorantia juris neminem

The two cases of S v Molubi (“Molubi”) and S v Coetzee (“Coetzee”) prove this point as they show that the courts add their own objective element to the test of intention when ignorance of the law is concerned, and often don’t allow for the defence if the accused was engaging in specialised activity and failed to take the appropriate steps to familiarise themselves with the law governing these activities. De Blom only raised the specialised activity rule where crimes involving negligence where involved rather than intention. Thus, it can be seen that despite the precedent created in De Blom – the courts do not often follow the