What are 'clean hands'?

[TJE"]

Just in search for some free legal knowledge. Can anyone explain in layman's terms, the principle of 'Clean Hands' as applied in Western law. I looked at the wikipedia definition and did'nt really get it.

[DCCougar]

I worked in civil rights law for several years but never heard of this. So of course I had to look it up.

This site has a pretty good explanation:

"Clean hands is the legal principle that only a party that has done nothing wrong can come to a court with a lawsuit against the other person. If the party bringing the suit has acted in an unfair, illegal, dishonest, or otherwise immoral way in regards to the subject matter at issue, then they have violated an equitable principle and have “unclean hands.”"

Here's a pretty good example....

"A doctor (plaintiff), who has left a partnership of doctors, sues the other doctors still in the partnership for money that he is allegedly owed under his contract with the partnership. The defense raises an unclean hands defense because the plaintiff has tried to take patients from the partnership’s practice. He also told incriminating lies about the remaining doctors in the partnership to convince patients to leave the partnership and come to him instead.

In this case, the doctor would not be able to successfully sue on equitable grounds for the money because he has unclean hands."

[TJE"]

Those are good explanations.

Thanks for looking it up for me

[kkrell]

It means somebody isn't supposed to benefit from their misdeeds. While you might see it in civil suits or family law, this might be a possible other example:

In cases of murder, the murderer is not allowed to benefit from their crime. For instance, if a spouse deliberately kills their partner, they should not be allowed to inherit, collect insurance, profit from a book deal about the crime, etc.

[DCCougar]

Originally Posted by kkrell

...this might be a possible other example:

In cases of murder, the murderer is not allowed to benefit from their crime. For instance, if a spouse deliberately kills their partner, they should not be allowed to inherit, collect insurance, profit from a book deal about the crime, etc.

Yes, that would be very unclean hands!

[SoCalSurf]

Judge Judy uses this phrase all the time. It usually entails a plaintiff's case being dismissed as they did something fraudulent and thus are not themselves innocent.

I love me some Judge Judy.

[619TF]

Originally Posted by kkrell

It means somebody isn't supposed to benefit from their misdeeds. While you might see it in civil suits or family law, this might be a possible other example:

In cases of murder, the murderer is not allowed to benefit from their crime. For instance, if a spouse deliberately kills their partner, they should not be allowed to inherit, collect insurance, profit from a book deal about the crime, etc.

Well you were right about the first part but the example you gave of a murder case is completely wrong. Those types of (inheritance/book sale profit) bans are done by acts of State/Federal legislatures and while the clean hands theory could well be the moral basis of where they come from they simply do not apply in that situation. It is generally just a defense to collecting money from someone else or to a lawsuit by someone else.

This site gives the best explanation with definitions that I found in a quick search: https://www.upcounsel.com/unclean-hands