''In re Winship'', 397 U.S. 358 (1970), was a

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

Supreme Court decision that held that "the Due Process Clause protects the accused against conviction except upon proof beyond a reasonable doubt of every fact necessary to constitute the crime charged."''Criminal Law - Cases and Materials'', 7th ed. 2012,

Wolters Kluwer Law & Business Wolters Kluwer N.V. () is a Dutch information services company. The company is headquartered in Alphen aan den Rijn, Netherlands (Global) and Philadelphia, United States (corporate). Wolters Kluwer in its current form was founded in 1987 with a m ...

; John Kaplan, Robert Weisberg, Guyora Binder,

/ref> It established this burden in all cases in all states (

constitutional case A constitutional ruling is a legal case in the United States in which the United States Supreme Court interprets the Constitution of the United States and makes a ruling that binds all states.''Criminal Law - Cases and Materials'', 7th ed. 2012, Wol ...

). The decision did not specify which facts constitute the charged crime. In an opinion authored by Justice Brennan, the Court held that when a juvenile is charged with an act that would be a crime if committed by an adult, every element of the offense must be proved

beyond reasonable doubt Beyond a reasonable doubt is a legal standard of proof required to validate a criminal conviction in most adversarial legal systems. It is a higher standard of proof than the balance of probabilities standard commonly used in civil cases, bec ...

, not

preponderance of the evidence In a legal dispute, one party has the burden of proof to show that they are correct, while the other party had no such burden and is presumed to be correct. The burden of proof requires a party to produce evidence to establish the truth of facts ...

. The case has come to stand for a broader proposition, however: in a criminal prosecution, every essential element of the offense must be proved beyond reasonable doubt. See, e.g., '' Apprendi v. New Jersey'', 530 U.S. 466, 477 (2000); '' Sullivan v. Louisiana'', 508 U.S. 275, 278 (1993). This case marked a rejection of the preponderance of evidence standard in any criminal cases and expanded the protections afforded by the Due Process Clause.

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External links

* United States Supreme Court cases United States Supreme Court cases of the Burger Court United States criminal burden of proof case law United States children's rights case law Juvenile case law 1970 in United States case law {{SCOTUS-case-stub

See also

References

External links