Enmund v. Florida

Under the system of law passed down to Americans via the English common-law system, guilt is personal and individual, rather than collective. This is the essence of the liberal Western tradition. By contrast, in a country such as China, family members are routinely held responsible for the crimes of a relative.

The only way an American citizen can be held guilty for another person's crime is if it can be proven that they aided or abetted the crime. They may either be an accessory before the fact, if they encouraged, ordered, aided, or advised the commission of a crime; or an accessory after the fact, if they gave aid to someone who they knew was a felon by assisting him in eluding capture or by destroying evidence.

These common-law classifications, which are coupled with principals in the first degree (those who actually commit the crime) and principals in the second degree (those who assist in the commission of the crime) are subject to some variation. For instance, in the case of Charles Manson, whose disciples murdered seven adults in Los Angeles over the course of two nights in August of 1969, Manson was clearly more than an accomplice before the fact, even though he was not actually present at the scene of the murders.