If the law intended for there to be an intent requirement, then the statute itself would say “knowingly” or “willfully”, which it clearly does not. This means that one can accidentally commit conspiracy, so long as the law you’re conspiring to break does not have an intent requirement.
I think we might have to agree to disagree. My understanding is that the conspiracy must intend to break the law. If one party doesn’t know the other is breaking the law, it isn’t conspiracy. If McKenzie didn’t have any illegal recommendations, or knowledge of illegal actions, they are in the clear.
If they advised Perdue to do something illegal, that is a different story
> My understanding is that the conspiracy must intend to break the law.
As a general rule, this is not how laws work. There are some laws that require that you know what you're doing is illegal (tax evasion is one of them), but most laws do not work this way.
I agree in general, but conspiracy is one of the few that do. They are called crimes of "specific intent".
>Conspiracy is a specific intent crime. Specific intent crimes require that the defendant act with a specific goal in mind. In the case of conspiracy, the defendant must intend to agree on a plan to commit an act and must intend to achieve the illegal goal of the conspiracy.[15] If either of these intents is missing, then the defendants cannot be charged with conspiracy.
