Definition
Bona utlagatorum (Latin: "goods of outlaws") is a common law doctrine establishing that the personal property and goods belonging to a person who had been declared an outlaw were forfeited to the Crown upon the pronouncement of outlawry. The outlaw, having been expelled from the protection of the law, lost all legal rights in property — and the Crown, as the sovereign authority, succeeded to those goods as a consequence of the judgment of outlawry. In some jurisdictions and periods, the goods passed first to the lord of the fee or the relevant franchise holder before escheating to the Crown.
Common Confusion
Bona utlagatorum is sometimes conflated with bona vacantia (goods of the vacant, i.e., ownerless property) or with escheat generally. The distinction matters: bona utlagatorum was triggered specifically by a formal legal judgment of outlawry against a living person, not by death without heirs or by abandonment. The property was forfeited because the individual had been declared outside the law's protection — a status imposed as a consequence of fleeing criminal process — not because ownership had lapsed or the owner had died without successors.
Why It Matters in Research
Bona utlagatorum is a term almost exclusively encountered in historical English legal sources. Researchers should be alert to several navigational issues:
First, the doctrine depends entirely on the institution of outlawry, which was formally abolished in England in civil proceedings by the Administration of Justice Act 1938 and had long fallen into disuse in criminal proceedings before that. Any legal authority invoking bona utlagatorum post-dates that context; modern appearances are almost always antiquarian or arise in the interpretation of historical instruments, grants, or franchise charters.
Second, the doctrine intersected significantly with franchise law. Many lords of manors and ecclesiastical bodies held by royal grant the franchise to receive bona utlagatorum within their jurisdiction — meaning the goods did not go directly to the Crown but to the franchise holder. Researchers examining historical title chains, manor records, or franchise grants must account for this layer when tracing property succession.
Third, in the Law Mind corpus, the bona fide purchaser doctrine creates an adjacent research concern. Where goods subject to bona utlagatorum had been transferred by the outlaw before the judgment of outlawry, questions arose as to whether a bona fide purchaser for value could hold against the Crown's claim. Burrill's citation to Hale's Analysis specifically flags this intersection. Researchers following property title disputes in historical English records should treat bona utlagatorum as a forfeiture risk that a bona fide purchaser defense might, or might not, defeat depending on the timing of the transfer relative to the outlawry judgment.
Fourth, American researchers should note that outlawry as a formal legal institution was not transplanted in full to U.S. jurisdictions. Colonial and early American law did not generally adopt bona utlagatorum as an operative doctrine, though forfeiture of goods upon conviction of certain felonies served a similar function in some states before such forfeitures were abolished or constitutionally restricted.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary defines the term tersely as "goods belonging to persons outlawed," which accurately captures the doctrine's core but gives no indication of the franchise complications or the bona fide purchaser question. Burrill's Law Dictionary is marginally more informative, specifying "English law" and citing Hale's Analysis — a reference to Sir Matthew Hale's analytical framework of English law — particularly for the bona fide purchaser dimension. Neither historical dictionary addresses the abolition of outlawry or the consequent obsolescence of the doctrine, nor do they illuminate the jurisdictional variation in franchise rights to receive such goods. Researchers relying solely on these definitions will have the Latin translated but will lack the contextual depth needed to use the doctrine in historical legal analysis.
Jurisdictional Note
Bona utlagatorum is a doctrine of English common law with no operative equivalent in modern U.S. federal or state law. To the extent it appears in American legal research, it will be in the context of interpreting historical grants, colonial-era instruments, or academic treatments of common law forfeiture history. Some early American statutes referenced common law forfeiture categories, but bona utlagatorum as a named doctrine did not take root in American jurisprudence.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
Recording Acts — Race, Notice, Race-Notice, and the Bona Fide Purchaser Doctrine (The Law Mind Real Estate Transactions & Construction Encyclopedia) — relevant for understanding whether a bona fide purchaser for value could defeat a Crown claim to goods transferred by an outlaw before judgment of outlawry.