Romans' Conquering of Crime

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Romans' Conquering of Crime

Intro: What type of crimes did they have?

Romans had many types of crimes. Here are some examples:>theft

>murder

>fraud (selling underweight goods e.g. bread)

>keeping streets clean.

Some of these are similar to today's crimes and some are different.

There is still theft, murder, and fraud today. Keeping streets clean

isn't a crime today but it can't be too dirty otherwise its

unhygienic.

How did the Romans try to stop crime?

The Romans had detailed laws covering all aspects of life. For

example, the crimes were outlined clearly,

>Murder

>Theft.

>Dangerous buildings.

>Cheating in trade.

>Keeping streets clean.

Over time the laws got more and more detailed. The Twelve Tables and

The Digest of the Roman Laws were introduced. They also had different

courts for minor and major crimes. The minor crimes were held in the

Magistrates courts and the major crimes were held in jury trials.

People thought the Roman justice system was fair. This is because any

Roman citizen could bring a case to court and the defendant was

innocent until proven guilty, but the slaves may not have thought this

as fair as they did not have these rights. This shows that the Romans

tried to prevent crime by making the laws more detailed and by making

sure that they had a fair legal system opened to every citizen, if not

slaves.

Were there any measures they didn't try?

Firstly the Romans didn't believe it was the state's responsibility to

prevent crime, so they didn't have any police force. They had VIGILES

but they were not responsible for catching criminals. The victim could

bring the accused to court for a trial and could gather evidence to

support his accusation otherwise there was nothing you could do about

it. They didn't have prisons, as there was no police force.

Who caught the criminals?

The victims and their families had to catch the criminals and find

evidence on them. For example, if a theft was committed the victim had

to gather evidence and summon the defendant to court.

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