To prevent usurpation, it was established that every person who exercised an authority not conferred on him by the people, should be devoted as a victim to the gods.[3] This, was at once a sentence of outlawry and excommunication; the Criminal might be slain by any person-with impunity, and all connection with him was shunned as pollution.7.

No magistrate could legally be brought to trial during the continuance of his office, but when his time was expired, he could be accused before the general assembly of the people, if he had transgressed the legal limits of his authority.

The punishment in this case was banishment; the form of the sentence declared that the criminal "should be deprived of fire and water;" that is, the citizens, were prohibited from supplying him with the ordinary necessaries of life.
8.

In all criminal trials, and in all cases where damages were sought to be recovered for wrongs or injuries, the praetor impanelled a jury, but the number of which it was to consist seems to have been left to his discretion.

The jurors were called ju'dices, and the opinion of the majority decided the verdict.