O modyfikacji funkcji błędu co do znamion czynu zabronionego

Abstract

ON THE MODIFICATION OF THE FUNCTION OF ERROR WITH REGARD TO THE FEATURES OF A  PROHIBITED ACT

The issue of error, for many reasons understated by justice practitioners, seems to be interesting to criminal law dogmatics, particularly for the sake of the constantly prevailing doubts involved with it. These doubts become apparent also in statutory regulations, which were most recently amended on 20 February 2015 in the act changing the Criminal Code, as well as many other acts. As a  result of these amendments, the statutory features of the function of error have been modified again. This kind of error — in case it turns out to be justified — results in the culprit not committing an offence.
That approach may lead to several questions, the most important of which can be summarised as follows:
firstly — what kind of features may become the subject of error and whether the mechanism of error formation for all kinds of features which could possibly lead to error is identical;
secondly — what are the criteria — especially in the context of answering the first question — for justifying the error committed by the culprit or deciding not to justify it;
thirdly — how to define the function of error from the perspective of the dogmatic structure of offence.
The analysis of the aforementioned issues leads to the conclusion that it is impossible to avoid the specific multiplications of the functions of justified error, since it fulfills different purposes, depending
on, for example, whether it refers to the features of a prohibited act committed intentionally or unintentionally.