Entrap

In criminal law, entrapment is a practice whereby a law enforcement agent induces a person to commit a criminal offence that the person would have otherwise been unlikely or unwilling to commit. It "is the conception and planning of an offence by an officer, and his procurement of its commission by one who would not have perpetrated it except for the trickery, persuasion or fraud of the officer."

Police conduct rising to the level of entrapment is broadly discouraged and thus, in many jurisdictions, is available as a defence against criminal liability. Sting operations, through which police officers or agents engage in deception to try to catch persons who are committing crimes, raise concerns about possible entrapment.

Depending on the law in the jurisdiction, the prosecution may be required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was not entrapped or the defendant may be required to prove that they were entrapped as an affirmative defence.

The word entrapment, from the verb "to ," meaning to catch in a trap, was first used in this sense in 1899 in the United States Federal Court case of People v Braisted.

The 1828 edition of Noah Webster's American Dictionary of the English Language defines entrap as:

The Supreme Court of Canada developed the doctrine of entrapment in three major decisions: R. v. Amato, [1982] 2 S.C.R. 418, R. v. Mack, [1988] 2 S.C.R. 903, and R. v. Barnes, [1991] 1 S.C.R. 449.

There are two different forms of entrapment in Canadian law.

The question of entrapment is considered only after there has been a finding of guilt. If, after finding the accused guilty, the court determines that the accused was entrapped, the court enters a judicial stay of proceedings. That is similar to an acquittal.

In German law, it is normally forbidden to induce or persuade someone to commit a crime or to attempt to do so. However, the German Federal Court of Justice has held that entrapment by undercover police agents is not a reason to stay the case . If undercover agents have been used without proper justification, punishment for the committed offense may be reduced.

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