A Comparative Study of Intentional Murder in Iranian and Canadian Law

There is no definition of murder in Iranian criminal law, but it can be defined as killing another human being. In Canadian criminal law, the legislator has described the murder as the act that intentionally leads to the death of another person. Intentional murder is a personal and individual crime, in addition to being a public crime. Like other crimes, intentional murder has elements and pillars from which this criminal phenomenon arises. In criminal law, the crime of intentional murder, like all other crimes, is subject to all three legal, material and spiritual elements. The psychological element of intentional murder is referred to as the mental interactions and criminal thoughts of the offender and is of great importance because the quality of that element has a marked effect on the type of homicide and on the level of punishment for the offender and can turn the criminal title of intentional murder into an unintentional homicide or a pure error. In Iranian law, homicide is subdivided into intentional murder and unintentional homicide, and even the legislator has distinguished the unintentional homicide resulting from driving violations from other types of unintentional homicide. In Islamic Penal Code of Iran, there is only one type of intentional murder. In addition, there is a difference between the punishment of intentional and unintentional murder and the severity of punishment between the two countries. According to the reaction of the Iranian penal system, punishment for intentional murder is execution according to Qisas (is an Islamic term meaning "retaliation in kind"), and under Article 229 of the Canadian Constitution, the punishment for intentional murder is life imprisonment.