legal cause

Legal cause, also known as proximate cause, is a concept in criminal law that refers to the relationship between the defendant’s actions and the resulting harm or injury.

In order to establish legal cause, the prosecution must demonstrate that the defendant’s actions were a direct and foreseeable cause of the harm or injury suffered by the victim.

Legal cause can be broken down into two components: cause-in-fact and proximate cause. Cause-in-fact refers to the direct link between the defendant’s actions and the resulting harm. Proximate cause, on the other hand, refers to the legal and policy considerations that limit a defendant’s liability for a particular harm or injury.

To establish proximate cause, the prosecution must demonstrate that the harm or injury suffered by the victim was a foreseeable consequence of the defendant’s actions and that there were no intervening causes that broke the chain of causation. Intervening causes can include acts by third parties or natural events that were not caused by the defendant’s actions.

In criminal law, the concept of legal cause is important in determining criminal liability. If the prosecution can establish that the defendant’s actions were a direct and foreseeable cause of the harm or injury suffered by the victim, then the defendant may be held criminally responsible for their actions.