Simons: Is Complexity a Virtue? Reconsidering Theft Crimes
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92 7 SIMONS.FINAL OR. DOCX (DO NOT DELETE) 11/13/2013 1:53 PM 927 Is Complexity a Virtue? Reconsidering Theft Crimes BOOK REVIEW OF STUART GREEN, T HIRTEEN W AYS TO STEAL A BICYCLE: T HEFT L AW IN THE I NFORMATION AGE KENNETH W. SIMONS * INTRODUCTION n his carefully argued, richly detailed, highly engaging new book, Thirteen Ways to Steal a Bicycle , 1 Professor Stuart Green considers the proper scope and contours of laws criminalizing theft. Although the subtitle of the book (Theft Law in the Information Age ) sugge sts t hat t he work focuses on contemporary “info rmat ion age” problems, the suggestion is a bit misl eading; t he book is not j ust an a pplica ti on of accepted dogma a bout theft law t o mode rn- day issues. Rather, it is a thor oug h rethinking of what should be punished as theft in the first instance and of what distinctions a theft statut e shoul d contain. 2 The book is an import ant contribution to criminal law scholarship on a topic that has been neglected by all but a handful of academics. Green critiques the recent Anglo-American movement to consolidate most theft offenses into a single crime of theft 3 and to greatly expand the kinds of property that the crime of theft encompasses. 4 Green’ s criticisms of consolidation are plausible and cogent, and his investigation of the application of theft law to intangible property is extremely valuable. The book expert ly examines th e intr icat e details of t heft doct ri ne; uses color ful, * Pro fessor o f Law, Associat e D ean for Facult y Re search , Boston Un iversity School of Law. 1 S TUART P. GREEN , 13 WAYS TO S TEAL A BICYCLE (2012). 2 See id. at 4-7. 3 The movement culminated in the United States’ Model Penal Code (MPC) and in England ’s Theft Ac t of 1968. See MODEL PENAL CODE §§ 223 .0-223.1 (1980 ); Theft Ac t of 1 968 , 1968, c. 60 (1968), available at htt p://www.leg islat ion.g o v.uk/ukp ga/1 968 /60 /dat a.p df . 4 GREEN , supra note 1, at 4. I
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