Elements of the crime of endangering a child

Abstract

The child receives great attention in national legislation, similar to international and regional laws, and this attention is justified, as what distinguishes children is the weakness of physical and mental capacity, which facilitates the commission of crimes against children without the slightest resistance. Among these crimes is the crime of exposing a minor to danger, which the Iraqi legislator stipulated in Article 383 of the Penal Code No. 111 of 1969. Therefore, the study aims to clarify the concept of the minor (child), and to define the elements of this crime, represented by the assumed element that requires a characteristic in (the victim), the material element, and the moral element. Therefore, the study aims to analyze the legal texts related to the crime in order to determine the elements that make it up. At the end of our research, we concluded that a minor is any person who has not reached the age of eighteen, and that this crime can occur through positive behavior such as abandonment, and can also occur through abstention such as deprivation of care. The crime of exposing a minor to danger is an intentional crime, in addition to being a formal crime that does not require actual harm to occur, as it is self-sufficient whether harm results from it or not, as it has a preventive nature.