Brown v. State

If, as it has been said, law is common sense as amended by the Legislature, it is an unfortunate fact that common sense is judicially modified as well.

At common law the crime of arson was a homeowner’s protection, criminalizing the wilful and malicious burning of the dwelling house of another. Rather than modify that common sense protection, the Legislature expanded its scope to include any building, whether owned by the person who burned it or by anyone else; 1 however, the safeguard for the innocent of requiring proof of a wilful and malicious state of mind was statutorily retained. Yet the…