Criminal libel

{{Short description|Legal term in English common law}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=September 2024}}

{{Use British English|date=August 2021}}

Criminal libel is a legal term, of English origin, which may be used with one of two distinct meanings, in those common law jurisdictions where it is still used.

It is an alternative name for the common law offence which is also known (in order to distinguish it from other offences of libel) as "defamatory libel"Halsbury's Laws of England, 2006 Reissue or, occasionally, as "criminal defamatory libel"."Criminal defamatory libel" is the name it is given by Card, Cross and Jones: Criminal Law, 12th ed, paragraph 8.4 at p 107.Brian A. Dasinge. [http://www.dasingerdefense.com/legal-services/criminal-defense/federal-offenses/] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140227151512/http://www.dasingerdefense.com/legal-services/criminal-defense/federal-offenses/ |date=27 February 2014 }}. Brian A. Dasinger, P.C.; 2014 [cited 27 February 2014]

It is also used as a collective term for all offences which consist of the publication of some prohibited matter in a libel (in permanent form), namely defamatory libel, seditious libel, blasphemous libel and obscene libel.The Law Commission, Criminal Libel, Working Paper No 84, 15 January 1982, paragraph 1.2Halsbury's Laws of England, 2006 Reissue

The common law offences of seditious libel, defamatory libel, and obscene libel were abolished in England and Wales and Northern Ireland on 12 January 2010 when section 73 of the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 came into force,{{cite web|title=Coroners and Justice Act 2009|url=http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2009/25/section/73|publisher=Government of the United Kingdom|access-date=28 February 2014}} blasphemous libel having already been abolished in England and Wales on 8 July 2008 by the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008. The Racial and Religious Hatred Act 2006 created instead the offence of inciting hatred against a person on the grounds of their race or religion.

Samoa's Crimes Act 2013 dropped reference to criminal libel, which had been on the statute books as part of the Crimes Act 1961.{{cite web |url=http://www.samoaobserver.ws/other/legal/5815-govt-instructs-ag-on-media-council |title=Govt. instructs AG on Media Council |newspaper=Samoa Observer |date=7 July 2013 |access-date=27 January 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180710163431/http://www.samoaobserver.ws/other/legal/5815-govt-instructs-ag-on-media-council |archive-date=10 July 2018 |url-status=dead }}[http://www.parliament.gov.ws/images/Acts_2013/Crimes_Act_2013_-_Eng.pdf Crimes Act 2013]{{dead link|date=December 2016 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}