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Wis. Stat. § 939.23

Criminal intent

Applied in 32 court decisions — leading case State v. Watkins (2002)

Most recently applied in Tyler A. Gonzales v. Cheryl Eplett (August 2023)

1979 c. 89; 1987 a. 332 s. 64; 1987 a. 399; 1993 a. 486.

How often courts cite this section

1989200020102020202360
citing decisions per year

Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.

(1) When criminal intent is an element of a crime in chs. 939 to 951, such intent is indicated by the term “intentionally”, the phrase “with intent to”, the phrase “with intent that”, or some form of the verbs “know” or “believe”.

(2) “Know” requires only that the actor believes that the specified fact exists.

(3) “Intentionally” means that the actor either has a purpose to do the thing or cause the result specified, or is aware that his or her conduct is practically certain to cause that result. In addition, except as provided in sub. (6), the actor must have knowledge of those facts which are necessary to make his or her conduct criminal and which are set forth after the word “intentionally”.

(4) “With intent to” or “with intent that” means that the actor either has a purpose to do the thing or cause the result specified, or is aware that his or her conduct is practically certain to cause that result.

(5) Criminal intent does not require proof of knowledge of the existence or constitutionality of the section under which the actor is prosecuted or the scope or meaning of the terms used in that section.

(6) Criminal intent does not require proof of knowledge of the age of a minor even though age is a material element in the crime in question.

Official source: Wisconsin State Legislature. Reproduced from public-domain Wisconsin statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.