One of three Porcian laws of the second century BC (associated with the Catos and with P. Porcius Laeca, tr. pl. 199) reinforcing the citizen's right of provocatio and forbidding the scourging or execution of a Roman citizen without trial. Cicero invokes it as the cornerstone of citizen liberty in the climactic outrage of Verr. 2.5 against Gavius and again in the Pro Rabirio.