What is "criminal negligence"

n. (context legal English) Failure to use reasonable care, and thus put someone at risk of injury or death.

n. (law) recklessly acting without reasonable caution and putting another person at risk of injury or death (or failing to do something with the same consequences) [syn: culpable negligence]

In criminal law, criminal negligence is a surrogate mens rea ( Latin for "guilty mind") required to constitute a conventional as opposed to strict liability offense. It is not, strictly speaking, a mens rea because it refers to an objective standard of behaviour expected of the defendant and does not refer to his mental state.