Commentary to Better Not to Know. On the Doctrine of Willful Ignorance in Criminal Law, by Ramon Ragués I Vallès

Abstract

In this paper, I will analyze the very structure of the doctrine of willful ignorance, the development of which is obviously favoured by the indeterminacy of the concept of malice (I). On the other hand, I will try to show that this doctrine, as developed by the Spanish Supreme Court (II) is both dangerous, as it constitutes a clear example of criminal retroactivity, which I will call epistemic, and revealing, probably beyond the so-called cases of willful ignorance, of the causal relationship between the judgements of moral reproachability that judges implicitly formulate and the decisions that impute criminal responsibility, independently of any epistemic element (III).