Definition
A criminal action is a formal legal proceeding brought by the state against a person accused of a public offense, with the purpose of establishing guilt and imposing punishment. It is the primary mechanism through which society, acting through government authority, prosecutes violations of the criminal law.
The term encompasses two recognized forms of state-initiated prosecution:
(1) An action prosecuted by the state as a party against a person charged with a public offense, for the punishment thereof.
(2) An action prosecuted by the state at the instance of an individual — that is, where a private complaint or victim report initiates the machinery of prosecution, but the state itself remains the prosecuting party.
In both forms, the defining characteristic is that the state — not a private party — is the plaintiff. The accused is the defendant. The object is punishment (including incarceration, fines, or other criminal penalties), not compensation. This distinguishes the criminal action from the civil action at the most fundamental level.
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Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): "Action" in ordinary English means a thing done, or the process of doing something. In compound phrases like "criminal action," non-lawyers often use it loosely to mean any criminal activity or wrongful conduct.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): "Action" in legal contexts was broadly understood as a lawsuit or legal proceeding, without distinction between civil and criminal.
The gap matters. In common usage, "criminal action" might describe the defendant's conduct — what the criminal did. In legal usage, it describes the proceeding brought against the defendant — what the government does in response. A researcher encountering the phrase in a historical document must read it in context: is the author describing the offense itself, or the prosecution?
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Common Confusion
CRIMINAL ACTION vs. CIVIL ACTION: The most persistent confusion. Both are "actions" in the procedural sense, but they differ in party, purpose, and burden. The state brings a criminal action; a private party brings a civil action. Criminal actions seek punishment; civil actions seek remedy. The same underlying conduct (assault, fraud, environmental harm) can give rise to both, proceeding simultaneously and independently. Historical sources sometimes blur this line, particularly in older equity and statutory contexts where "action" was used loosely.
CRIMINAL ACTION vs. CRIMINAL PROCEEDING: These terms are often used interchangeably but carry technical distinctions in some jurisdictions. "Criminal proceeding" is broader and may include pre-charge investigative steps, grand jury proceedings, and post-conviction matters. "Criminal action" more precisely refers to the adversarial proceeding from charge through judgment.
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Why It Matters in Research
The phrase "criminal action" appears across centuries of legal writing, but its technical precision varies by era and jurisdiction. In early common law sources, the vocabulary of "action" was deeply tied to civil procedure — the forms of action — and the criminal counterpart was often described in terms of indictment, prosecution, or information rather than "action." When historical sources use "criminal action," researchers should not assume modern procedural meaning maps cleanly onto older usage.
California's Penal Code definition (§ 683), which Black's quotes directly, reflects a codified, late-nineteenth-century approach to defining criminal procedure by statute. Researchers working in jurisdictions that adopted Field Code-style procedural reforms will find this definition influential. Jurisdictions that retained common law criminal procedure longer may use the phrase differently or not at all as a term of art.
The corporate criminal liability context adds a layer of complexity: when a corporate entity is the defendant in a criminal action, questions of who "the accused" is, and how punishment applies to a non-natural person, become live research issues. The Law Mind Encyclopedia's treatment of corporate criminal liability engages these questions directly.
In environmental law, the distinction between administrative orders, civil enforcement actions, and criminal prosecution is operationally significant. EPA criminal actions are reserved for willful or knowing violations and carry different procedural protections (including grand jury, jury trial rights, and higher evidentiary standards) than civil enforcement. Researchers conflating civil and criminal enforcement pathways in environmental sources will misread the stakes and procedures involved.
One trap in historical sources: the phrase "criminal action" was sometimes used in a quasi-civil sense in early American practice to describe penal actions brought by informers or private prosecutors under qui tam-style statutes. These are not criminal actions in the modern sense and should be distinguished.
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Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary tracks closely with the California Penal Code definition, quoting it directly. This reflects Black's characteristic method of anchoring definitions to statutory text where available, particularly from the code-reform era of the late 1800s.
The Black's definition is notable for what it makes explicit: the state is always the prosecuting party, even when the action is initiated by a private individual's complaint. This resolves an ambiguity that older common law sources left open — the role of private prosecution in criminal matters. English common law permitted substantial private prosecution; American codified procedure progressively transferred that function to public officers (district attorneys, state's attorneys, prosecutors general).
Historical dictionaries generally agree that the criminal action is defined by its object (punishment) and its party structure (state v. accused). Where they diverge is in the treatment of hybrid proceedings — penal actions, qui tam suits, and private prosecutions — which older sources sometimes classify under criminal action and newer sources exclude entirely.
What historical sources tend to underemphasize: the constitutional dimensions of the criminal action. The right to jury trial, the privilege against self-incrimination, double jeopardy protections, and the beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard all attach specifically to criminal actions and not to civil actions. These constitutional attributes are largely absent from the historical dictionary treatments, which focus on party and purpose rather than procedural rights.
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Jurisdictional Note
Most U.S. jurisdictions define criminal action by statute or court rule, and the definitions are broadly consistent with Black's. However, terminology varies: some jurisdictions use "criminal case," "prosecution," or "criminal proceeding" as the primary term of art, reserving "action" for civil matters. Federal practice under the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure uses "case" and "proceeding" rather than "action" as the operative vocabulary.
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Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
Criminal Law — Corporate Criminal Liability (The Law Mind Criminal Law Encyclopedia)
EPA Enforcement — Administrative Orders, Civil Actions, and Criminal Prosecution (The Law Mind Environmental & Energy Law Encyclopedia)
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