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"ignorance is not a defense" - It is a defense. Any reasonable person would accept "i did not know this thing i was doing, which hurts no one, was illegal" as d
by MarkPNeyer 12y ago
"ignorance is not a defense" - It is a defense. Any reasonable person would accept "i did not know this thing i was doing, which hurts no one, was illegal" as defense against charges of a crime.
It's just not a _legal_ defense because the legal system unreasonably expects people to know and comply with the massive, ever-growing battery of laws.
- bmelton 12y ago"It will be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man who knows what the law is today can guess what is will be tomorrow." – James Madison
- cwp 12y agoNot only that, but the law in question explicitly references motive. Breaking a large deposit into smaller deposits is only illegal if you do it to avoid triggering reporting. So ignorance of the reporting requirements is a defence. If you didn't know it existed, how could you try to avoid it?