Law School

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EPISODE SUMMARY
An estate in land is a present or future ownership interest measured by time. The fee simple absolute is the largest estate, potentially infinite in duration and freely transferable, devisable, and descendible. Traditional language “to A and her heirs” created a fee simple absolute, though modern law usually does not require those words.
The fee tail historically kept land within a family line but has mostly been abolished or converted in American jurisdictions.
Defeasible fees are fee simple estates that may end upon a specified event. A fee simple determinable ends automatically and leaves the grantor with a possibility of reverter. A fee simple subject to condition subsequent does not end automatically; the grantor has a right of entry. A fee simple subject to executory limitation ends automatically in favor of a third party, who holds an executory interest.
A life estate lasts for a person’s life. A life tenant may possess and use the property but may not commit waste. Voluntary waste is affirmative destruction. Permissive waste is neglect. Ameliorative waste is a substantial change, even one that increases value, though modern law is more flexible.
Future interests retained by the grantor include reversions, possibilities of reverter, and rights of entry. Future interests in transferees include vested remainders, contingent remainders, and executory interests. A remainder waits until the natural end of the prior estate. An executory interest cuts short another estate or divests the grantor after a gap.
The Rule Against Perpetuities invalidates certain future interests unless they must vest, if at all, within twenty-one years after a life in being at creation. It mainly applies to contingent remainders, executory interests, and certain class gifts. It generally does not apply to grantor interests or vested remainders.
The key lesson is disciplined parsing. Read conveyances word by word, identify the present estate, identify the future interest, and test remote vesting when required.

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EPISODE SUMMARY
Property rights are legal relationships among people with respect to things. Ownership does not mean unlimited control. It may include rights to possess, exclude, use, enjoy, transfer, devise, lease, mortgage, or abandon property, but those rights are limited by law and competing interests.
The right to exclude is one of the most important property rights, but it is not absolute. Necessity, anti-discrimination law, landlord-tenant protections, public accommodations rules, emergency access, constitutional limits, and other doctrines may restrict exclusion.
Property is often described as a bundle of rights. Different people may hold different sticks in the bundle, including possession, future interests, easements, mortgages, leases, covenants, and regulatory authority.
Real property generally includes land and interests in land. Personal property includes movable objects and intangible rights. Classification matters because different rules apply.
First possession can create property rights in previously unowned things. In capture cases, mere pursuit is usually not enough. Capture, killing, mortal wounding, trapping, or certain control is required. The rule promotes certainty and reduces conflict.
Finder law teaches relativity of title. Lost property is unintentionally parted with. Mislaid property is intentionally placed and forgotten. Abandoned property is intentionally relinquished. Treasure trove is often treated under modern lost, mislaid, abandoned, or statutory rules. A finder may have rights against later possessors, but not usually against the true owner.
A valid inter vivos gift requires donative intent, delivery, and acceptance. Donative intent must be present, not merely a promise of future transfer. Delivery may be actual, constructive, or symbolic. Acceptance is usually presumed for beneficial gifts. Gifts causa mortis are made in contemplation of imminent death and are treated cautiously.
A bailment occurs when a bailor transfers possession of personal property to a bailee for a limited purpose, with an obligation to return or handle the property as directed. The bailee must exercise the required care.
The key lesson is that Property begins with possession but moves quickly to the quality, source, limits, and priority of rights. The best Property answers identify the thing, classify the property, trace how the right was acquired, and compare the competing claims.

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EPISODE SUMMARY
Defenses complete the structure of Criminal Law. Some defenses negate elements; others justify or excuse conduct. Justification means the act was legally permissible under the circumstances. Excuse means the act was wrongful, but the defendant is not properly blameworthy.
Self-defense permits reasonable force against imminent unlawful force. Deadly force requires a threat of death, serious bodily injury, or another qualifying grave harm. Initial aggressors usually must withdraw before claiming self-defense. Defense of others protects reasonable intervention. Defense of property permits reasonable nondeadly force but rarely deadly force.
Necessity justifies choosing the lesser evil in an emergency. Duress excuses conduct committed under imminent threat by another person. Mistake of fact may negate mens rea. Mistake of law usually is not a defense, subject to narrow exceptions. Voluntary intoxication may sometimes negate specific intent; involuntary intoxication may be broader. Insanity depends on the jurisdiction’s legal test. Infancy concerns the criminal responsibility of children. Entrapment focuses on improper government inducement and lack of predisposition.
The complete Criminal Law method is element-based and cumulative. Identify the offense, break it into elements, analyze actus reus, mens rea, concurrence, causation, grading, parties, inchoate liability, and defenses. The best answers do not rely on moral intuition. They prove or disprove every legally required step.

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EPISODE SUMMARY
Parties to crime must be analyzed role by role. A person may be liable as an accomplice if the person intentionally aids, assists, encourages, facilitates, or solicits the principal’s crime with the required mental state. The usual requirements are assistance or encouragement plus intent to aid and intent that the crime be committed.
Mere presence at the scene is not enough. Mere knowledge is usually not enough. But presence, companionship, prior planning, lookout behavior, flight, and sharing proceeds may be evidence of assistance and intent. Assistance may include tools, information, transportation, lookout conduct, encouragement, disabling security, luring the victim, or a prior promise of help.
Common law distinguished principals in the first degree, principals in the second degree, accessories before the fact, and accessories after the fact. Modern law often punishes principals and accessories before the fact as principals. Accessory after the fact is usually a separate offense because the assistance occurs after the crime is complete.
Some jurisdictions recognize natural-and-probable-consequences liability, making an accomplice liable for additional crimes that foreseeably flow from the intended crime. Result crimes, especially homicide, require careful analysis of the accomplice’s mental state and the jurisdiction’s rules.
Withdrawal may avoid liability if it occurs before the crime and is timely and effective. The accomplice must repudiate encouragement, neutralize aid, or otherwise prevent the crime as required by the circumstances.
Accomplice liability differs from conspiracy. Conspiracy is a separate offense based on agreement. Accomplice liability is a theory for holding one person liable for another’s completed crime. Pinkerton liability, where recognized, is based on foreseeable crimes committed by co-conspirators in furtherance of the conspiracy.
Corporations may be criminally liable for acts of agents within the scope of employment and at least partly intended to benefit the corporation. Individual officers may be liable for participation, authorization, willful blindness, or responsible-corporate-officer duties in regulatory contexts.
The key lesson is precision. Ask what each actor did, what each actor intended, and which crimes can fairly be attributed to each person under accomplice, conspiracy, corporate, or vicarious liability doctrines.

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EPISODE SUMMARY
Inchoate crimes punish dangerous movement toward crime before the target offense is completed. The major inchoate crimes are attempt, solicitation, and conspiracy.Attempt requires intent to commit the target crime plus an act sufficiently close to completion. Attempt is a specific-intent offense even when the completed crime can be committed with a lower mental state. The hardest issue is distinguishing preparation from attempt. Tests include the last-act test, dangerous-proximity test, probable-desistance test, unequivocality test, and the Model Penal Code substantial-step test. Factual impossibility usually is not a defense. Legal impossibility may be a defense in limited circumstances, though modern law often narrows it. Abandonment traditionally was not a defense after attempt was complete, but the MPC may allow voluntary and complete renunciation.Solicitation is asking, encouraging, commanding, or requesting another person to commit a crime, with intent that the crime be committed. It is complete when the request is made, even if the person solicited refuses or does nothing.Conspiracy is an agreement to commit a crime, with intent to agree and intent that the crime be committed. Many jurisdictions require an overt act, which may be minor. Traditional bilateral conspiracy requires two guilty minds; unilateral conspiracy allows liability where the defendant believes an agreement exists, even if the other person is feigning agreement. Pinkerton liability may make conspirators liable for reasonably foreseeable crimes committed by co-conspirators in furtherance of the conspiracy. Withdrawal may cut off liability for future crimes but usually does not erase the conspiracy already committed.Merger rules are important. Attempt usually merges into the completed offense. Solicitation often merges into a later completed offense or conspiracy. Conspiracy generally does not merge with the completed crime.The key lesson is separation. In every inchoate-crimes problem, analyze solicitation, conspiracy, attempt, merger, withdrawal, abandonment, and completion as distinct issues.