" CORPUS DELICTI."
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
Sra,—In the review of " Studies in Murder," in your issue of October 4th, the writer, dealing with the case of Russell Colvin, who was alleged to have been murdered, concludes with the moral, " Never convict without proof of the corpus delicti." Are we to infer that the body of the man alleged to have been murdered is referred to as the corpus delicti My dictionary states the corpus delicti to be "the body or substance of a crime or offence." This is correct, though I think it might have been more plainly and concisely stated as " the fact " of a crime or offence.
I have often encountered the idea that corpus delicti is the body of the person alleged to have been killed, but really it applies to the fact of the crime charged having been com- mitted, be it homicide, or arson, or defamation, or any crime or offence. Without this being clearly established there should not be a conviction. Even the Justice of the Peace commenting on the Crippen case, which was analogous to that of Russell Colvin, fell into the error. I pointed this out, and the editor very handsomely published my letter with an acknowledgment that my criticism was justified.
Previous page
