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The legal history of in-transit robbery

The crime of in-transit robbery is a sub-specie of the common law crime of robbery, which in essence is a crime of theft with violence. Robbery had evolved from begging, where beggars would harass their victims for money or items of value and then elevating their begging efforts to threats of violence, and in certain instances the usage of physical violence to solicit alms. As soon as road transport became prominent in society, the incidence of in-transit robbery increased where violence was used to overcome any form of resistance from the victim. During sea-faring transportation, piracy occurred using similar methods of violence to obtain goods from victims. In-transit robbery has undergone many changes in terms of modus operandi. From the early days of violent begging during the Roman Empire it has now become a greed driven, carefully planned crime, which is executed with military precision with high technology weapons of war. Robbery has advanced in judicial terms from a non-codified crime to a specific defined crime which carries prescribed minimum sentencing as punishment. / Abstract

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:nmmu/vital:10263
Date January 2007
CreatorsCoetzer, André Lodewyk
PublisherNelson Mandela Metropolitan University, Faculty of Law
Source SetsSouth African National ETD Portal
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeThesis, Masters, LLM
Formatiii, 67 leaves, pdf
RightsNelson Mandela Metropolitan University

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