Crime
Crime (aparādha) is an act or actions that violates the law prohibiting it and for which a court can impose punishment. Crimes are usually divided into two types – those like murder or rape which are wrong in themselves (mala in se) and others like gambling or taking drugs which are wrong because society seeks to regulate them for its own well-being (mala prohibita). The first type of crime usually contravene the Precepts while the second type may or may not. Crime, its causes and prevention and the treatment of those who commit it have long occupied the minds of philosophers, jurists and sociologists although the Buddha seems to have been the first person in history to try to give a theory of the origins of crime. In the famous Aggañña Sutta he says that it was only after the development of the concept of private property that crime arose (D.III,92).
Dhamma, Man and Law, K.N. Jayatilleke,1989.
