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In English law, the benefit of clergy (Law Latin: privilegium clericale) was originally a provision by which clergymen accused of a crime could claim that they were outside the jurisdiction of the secular courts and be tried instead in an ecclesiastical court under canon law. The ecclesiastical courts were generally seen as being more lenient in their prosecutions and punishments, and defendants made many efforts to claim clergy status, often on questionable or fraudulent grounds.
Various reforms limited the scope of this legal arrangement to prevent its abuse, including branding of a thumb upon first use, to limit the number of invocations for some. Eventually, the benefit of clergy evolved into a legal fiction in which first-time offenders could receive lesser sentences for some crimes (the so-called "clergyable" ones). The legal mechanism was abolished in the United Kingdom in 1827 with the passage of the Criminal Law Act 1827.
Without BenefitofClergy is a 1921 American silent drama film directed by James Young and featuring Virginia Brown Faire, Thomas Holding and Boris Karloff...
The BenefitofClergy Act 1575 (18 Eliz. 1. c. 7), long title An Act to take away clergy from the offenders in rape and burglary, and an order for the...
The BenefitofClergy Act 1496, formally referred to as the Act 12 Hen. 7 c. 7, was an Act of the Parliament of England, passed during the reign of Henry...
The BenefitofClergy Act 1402 (4 Hen. 4. c. 3) was an Act passed during the reign of Henry IV of England by the Parliament of England. It abolished compurgation...
England in 1550. From the time of Henry VII, branding was inflicted for all offences which received benefitofclergy. Branding of the thumbs was used around...
variety of names, such as manse, parsonage, rectory, or vicarage. A clergy house is typically owned and maintained by a church, as a benefit to its clergy. This...
judges for convicted criminals. With modifications to the traditional benefitofclergy, which originally exempted only clergymen from the general criminal...
by torture, the sentence was thus imposed by attainder and without benefitofclergy. His execution took place on April 15, 1532 at Smithfield. A contemporary...
District" "Without BenefitofClergy" "At the End of the Passage" "The Mutiny of the Mavericks" "The Mark of the Beast" "The Recrudescence of Imray" (later...
Henry's political desire to restrict the privilege ofbenefitofclergy. Fisher was a staunch defender of the privilege, and, she says, would have condemned...
sorceries or any of them take upon them to tell or declare where goodes stollen or lost shall become ... The Act also removed the benefitofclergy, a legal device...
orders ofbenefitofclergy. This act, though its duration was limited to a single year, was vehemently denounced by Richard Kidderminster, abbot of Winchcombe...
spilled into the streets. Because students had benefitofclergy, which exempted them from the jurisdiction of the king's courts, angry complaints were filed...
Commentaries on the Laws of England, William Blackstone, Book 4 chapter 14 BenefitofClergy Act 1496 (12 Hen. 7 c. 7) Hale's History of Pleas of the Crown (1800...
claimed the benefitofclergy, while an illiterate person who had memorized the psalm used in the literacy test could also claim the benefitofclergy. Despite...
particularly the benefitofclergy. It was repealed by the Criminal Law Act 1967. The Act has sixteen parts. Parts I - V concerned the formalities of pleading...
notorious use of the act was the Peterloo Massacre of 1819 in Manchester. The act also made it a felony punishable by death without benefitofclergy for "any...
"An Act for repealing various Statutes in England relative to the BenefitofClergy, and to Larceny and other Offences connected therewith, and to malicious...
usage the interpretations of the law do now conform." The death penalty for felony could be avoided by pleading benefitofclergy, which gradually evolved...
common law categorical test for provocation. The Statute of Stabbing had removed the benefitofclergy for cases where there was a killing without provocation...
Times, The New Yorker, and Vanity Fair and was one of the biggest box-office draws and movie idols of the 1930s. Active in both Britain and Hollywood, Howard...
the U.S., that derived from it. Here criminals could apply for the benefitofclergy. Being in holy orders, or fraudulently claiming to be, meant that...
Act of the 18th of Edward III (1344) and the Charter of Edward IV (1462), eventually settled this long-standing dispute. See also benefitofclergy. v...
Act of Parliament to be felonious without benefitofclergy; or, in other words, to be worthy of instant death. Leon Radzinowicz listed 49 pages of "Capital...
Reynard, a painter and teacher of Gurdjieff Movements, and Frank R. Sinclair, author of Without BenefitofClergy and Of the Life Aligned, until Reynard's...