CARRY AWAY

Definition

In criminal law, "carry away" — also rendered as *asportation* — is the act of physically moving stolen property from its original location. It is one of the required elements of common law larceny, establishing that the thief exercised dominion and control over the property by displacing it, however slightly, from the place where it was found. The movement required is minimal. Courts have held that even a few inches of displacement satisfies the element, provided the movement was intentional and without the owner's consent. What matters is not the distance traveled but the fact of removal: the property was disturbed from its resting place at the will of the taker. "Carry away" is distinct from the act of "taking" (*caption*). Taking refers to the moment the trespasser gains control of the property; carrying away is the subsequent movement that completes the act of larceny. Both must be present for larceny to be consummated at common law.

Common Language

Modern common usage (Wiktionary): To steal or take away; also used more loosely to mean being overwhelmed emotionally ("carried away by excitement") or charmed by something. Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): To transport or remove from a place; often used in contexts of force, wind, or strong emotion displacing a person or object. The legal meaning is narrower and more technical than either common usage. In ordinary speech, "carry away" implies substantial physical removal — moving something elsewhere. In law, the displacement can be vanishingly small. A thief who lifts a wallet from a pocket and drops it immediately has satisfied the element. The colloquial sense of being "carried away" emotionally has no legal relevance to this term.

Common Confusion

CARRY AWAY vs. THEFT / LARCENY: "Carry away" is an element of larceny, not a crime in itself. Writers sometimes use "carry away" as shorthand for the entire offense of larceny or theft; this is imprecise and can obscure whether the full elements of the crime were present. CARRY AWAY vs. ASPORTATION: These terms are functionally synonymous in the larceny context. "Asportation" is the Latin-derived technical term; "carry away" is the English equivalent used in older common law pleading and many statutes. Researchers will encounter both, often in the same source. CARRY AWAY vs. TAKING (CAPTION): Taking and carrying away are distinct sequential acts. Taking establishes dominion; carrying away confirms it through movement. Some older authorities conflate them; careful reading requires distinguishing which element is actually at issue.

Core Elements

For "carry away" to satisfy the larceny element, the movement must be: 1. ACTUAL: There must be physical displacement, not merely an attempt to move the property or an intent to do so. 2. INTENTIONAL: The movement must be volitional. Accidental displacement does not satisfy the element. 3. WITHOUT CONSENT: Movement at the direction or with the permission of the owner negates the element. 4. OF PERSONAL PROPERTY: At common law, the element applies only to movable, tangible property (personalty). Real property and fixtures could not be "carried away" in the larceny sense.

Why It Matters in Research

The most important trap in historical sources is the property classification problem Anderson's identifies: at common law, things attached to the land — trees, fruit, flowers, title-deeds — were not personalty and therefore could not be the subject of larceny by carrying away. They were treated as part of the realty. The same physical act of removal that would constitute larceny for a chattel might be only a trespass when the object was severed directly from land. However, if the owner had already severed the item, or if the thief had severed it at a prior time, that prior act of severance converted the object to personalty — and a subsequent carrying away could then constitute larceny. Statute law has substantially displaced this distinction. Researchers working with 19th-century and earlier materials must pay close attention to whether the jurisdiction had enacted provisions covering timber, crops, fruit, and similar items, because the common law baseline would leave those thefts outside larceny doctrine entirely. The "felonious intent" requirement (animo furandi) is equally critical. Anderson's makes explicit what many entries omit: taking property with intent to use it temporarily and return it was not larceny at common law — it was trespass. This distinction directly affects how historical indictments and verdicts should be read. A researcher finding an acquittal on a larceny charge in older records should consider whether the defense turned on this intent point rather than on whether carrying away occurred at all. The minimal-movement rule creates a related research hazard: modern readers may underestimate how easily the element was satisfied in historical practice. Disputes in older cases were far more likely to center on intent, on the character of the property as personalty, or on consent — not on whether sufficient movement had occurred.

Historical Dictionary Support

Anderson's Dictionary of Law addresses carry away in the context of larceny's elements, emphasizing two constraints that governed the doctrine: the felonious intent requirement (animo furandi) and the personalty limitation. Anderson's is explicit that a taking with intent to return the property is mere trespass, not larceny — a line that was fiercely contested in common law courts and that statutes have since blurred or eliminated in many jurisdictions. Anderson's treatment of the personalty rule is particularly useful, walking through the severance doctrine that transformed real property attachments into personalty upon separation. The entry flags statutory expansion as the corrective to common law gaps, without cataloguing the statutes — appropriate for a general dictionary but a signal to researchers that jurisdiction-specific legislative research is required. What historical dictionaries, including Anderson's, tend to understate is the minimal-movement threshold. The classical authorities required only slight asportation, a point that became well-settled in the case law but was rarely dramatized in the dictionary literature. Researchers relying solely on dictionary treatment may not appreciate how low the bar was set.

Jurisdictional Note

Modern American criminal codes have largely absorbed larceny's common law elements into consolidated theft statutes, and many no longer require proof of asportation as a distinct element. Researchers working with pre-consolidation materials or jurisdictions that retain common law larceny definitions must apply the traditional framework. The personalty limitation and the severance doctrine vary in how fully they survive statutory reform.

Encyclopedia Cross-Reference

The Law Mind Family Law Encyclopedia: Child Custody — Relocation (Move-Away Cases) (family_77) — relevant when "carry away" appears in the distinct context of parental abduction or custodial interference, where removal of a child triggers both criminal and family law consequences.

Related Terms