Speaking as a semanticist, it's wild to me that they are phrasing it in terms of whether an *act* is characterized as "official", when what they seem to actually be talking about is whether there exists a *description* of the act that can be characterized as "official".
The idea of not looking to motive isntithetical to the most basic principles of criminal law, which require both an actus reus (act) and a mens rea (state of mind) to constitute a crime. For example, it can be perfectly legal to buy a cop a cup of coffee but not if you’re trying to bribe them.
Without looking at mens rea, you’re effectively presuming an innocent intent for any action, and virtually nothing in criminal law has strict liability (ie liability irrespective of intent). The only thing that jumps to mind are status crimes, like illegal immigration.
