During the Elizabethan Era, courts were commonly regarded as being of a corrupt nature. One member of Parliament defined a justice of the peace as ??an animal who, for half-a-dozen chickens, would dispense with a dozen laws.?? Criminal law was completely dependent upon deterrents, as opposed to surveillance or detection; laws were weak, but punishments were severe. was the statutory penalty for any of two hundred offenses. These offenses included blackmail, cutting down young trees, and theft of over one schilling. As such, an average Elizabethan year saw eight-hundred people hanged in England for crime. …
