Participation in a Crime after the Moment of its End: Touching a Crime or Complicity?

Abstract

The article analyzes the possibility of complicity in a crime after the moment of its legal termination in relation to ongoing crimes, crimes with a truncated composition, crimes with several mandatory actions and crimes with alternative actions. The significance of preliminary conspiracy and awareness of the fact of joining a legally completed, but actually ongoing criminal attack for establishing complicity in a crime is explored. The rules for qualifying complicity are analyzed in detail when an accomplice joins the excesses of the perpetrator of robbery, the retention of a kidnapped victim that was not promised in advance, and legally completed rape. It is concluded that complicity in a crime can take place not only before the moment of its legal completion, but also after it — up to the moment of the actual end of the criminal attack, while the commission of actions after this moment and in connection with the completed criminal attack is an implication for crime.