Definition
With deliberate intent to injure another, or with such wanton disregard of another's rights that the law treats the conduct as equivalent to actual ill-will. As an adverb modifying criminal charges or civil claims, "maliciously" signals that the actor's state of mind — not merely the act itself — is a required element of liability or guilt.
The term carries two distinct but related meanings depending on context:
1. In criminal law: Acting with a conscious purpose to cause harm, or with knowledge that harm is substantially certain to result. Statutes using "maliciously" typically require the prosecution to prove this mental state beyond a reasonable doubt. It appears most often in offenses involving property destruction, threats, and injury to animals.
2. In civil law: Acting either with actual spite or ill-will toward a specific person, or with such reckless indifference to the consequences of one's conduct that the law imputes malice regardless of subjective motive. This constructive or implied malice is particularly significant in malicious prosecution and abuse of process claims, where the plaintiff must show the defendant acted maliciously in initiating legal proceedings.
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Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): "In a malicious manner, or for malicious reasons."
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): Not separately listed; understood as the adverbial form of "malicious" — having or showing ill-will; disposed to injure others without cause.
The gap between common and legal usage is real and matters in research. Ordinary readers understand "maliciously" as requiring personal spite or hatred toward a victim. Legal usage is considerably broader: courts regularly find that a defendant acted maliciously without any evidence of personal animosity, when the conduct reflects a reckless disregard of others' rights that the law is willing to treat as equivalent to deliberate harm. Researchers reading indictments or pleadings that allege "maliciously" should not assume the accuser is claiming the defendant hated the victim.
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Common Confusion
MALICIOUSLY vs. WILLFULLY vs. WANTONLY: These three adverbs frequently appear together in criminal statutes and tort pleadings, and courts sometimes treat them as interchangeable — they are not. "Willfully" typically means the act was done voluntarily and intentionally, without requiring any hostile purpose. "Wantonly" describes conduct showing a reckless disregard for consequences, often with less emphasis on intent to harm a specific person. "Maliciously" occupies a middle ground, requiring either actual ill-will or at minimum a careless disregard of rights that the law construes as malice. Older authorities, including Bouvier's, sometimes blur these lines; researchers should check how the specific jurisdiction and era defined each term rather than relying on a single source.
MALICIOUSLY vs. MALICE: "Maliciously" is the adverb describing the manner of an act; "malice" is the underlying mental state alleged to exist. Pleadings may allege that a defendant acted maliciously, that the defendant harbored malice, or both — but the distinction between malice as a term of art and "maliciously" as a pleading word can affect what must be proven.
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Why It Matters in Research
The word "maliciously" is a living trap in historical legal sources. Its meaning has shifted substantially between the common law era and modern doctrine, and it varies by claim type even within a single jurisdiction and time period.
In older criminal indictments, "maliciously" was largely a pleading word — an almost ritualistic inclusion whose omission could defeat a charge on technical grounds, regardless of the actual evidence of intent. Researchers reading 18th and 19th century indictments should recognize that its presence tells them about pleading conventions as much as about the defendant's actual mental state.
In the Law Mind corpus, the term will appear in at least three distinct contexts requiring separate analysis: (1) criminal statutes defining offenses by mental state, where the specific statutory definition governs; (2) malicious prosecution and abuse of process cases, where courts wrestle with whether subjective ill-will is required or whether an improper purpose suffices; and (3) common law property offenses, particularly malicious mischief and injury to animals, where "maliciously" had a more concrete and somewhat narrower meaning.
Jurisdictional drift is significant. Some jurisdictions use "maliciously" in statutes that have been interpreted to require actual subjective intent to harm; others accept implied or constructive malice. Model Penal Code jurisdictions largely displaced "maliciously" with the more precise categories of purpose, knowledge, recklessness, and negligence — so post-MPC sources may use the term rarely or not at all, while pre-MPC authorities use it extensively.
Researchers working on malicious prosecution claims should note the dual requirement that appears across most jurisdictions: the underlying proceeding must have been brought both without probable cause and maliciously. These are separate elements, and courts have held that lack of probable cause alone does not establish that the defendant acted maliciously.
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Historical Dictionary Support
Bouvier's definition is compact but illuminating on two points that researchers should carry forward. First, Bouvier ties "maliciously" to actual deliberate intent to injure, citing Connecticut authority, but immediately broadens the concept to include "careless disregard of the rights of others which, without real ill-will, the law implies as malice" — an early and clear statement of implied or constructive malice. Second, Bouvier distinguishes contexts: suing out an attachment maliciously has a specific technical meaning, while "maliciously" in the context of cruelty to animals carries a narrower, more morally loaded sense of wicked revenge or wanton cruelty.
What Bouvier's does not address is the doctrinal tension that later courts would resolve in different ways: whether implied malice satisfies a statutory element that uses the word "maliciously," or whether that standard belongs only to civil pleading. Modern researchers should not assume Bouvier's treatment of implied malice in civil contexts transfers automatically to criminal statutory interpretation.
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Jurisdictional Note
Jurisdictions that have adopted the Model Penal Code's culpability framework have largely retired "maliciously" as a statutory term, replacing it with "purposely," "knowingly," or "recklessly." In those jurisdictions, older cases defining "maliciously" remain useful for understanding common law origins but may not control interpretation of current statutes. Jurisdictions retaining the term in active criminal statutes — particularly for offenses like malicious mischief, malicious wounding, or malicious burning — each have their own case law defining what "maliciously" requires, and these definitions do not uniformly align.
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Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
Intentional Torts — Wrongful Arrest and Malicious Prosecution (The Law Mind Torts & Personal Injury Encyclopedia): Covers the malice element in malicious prosecution claims, including the distinction between actual and implied malice and the relationship between lack of probable cause and malicious intent.
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