Breach of the peace Flashcards
Cameron v Normand 1992
two boys were kicking a football into traffic they were charged with breach of the peace
MacDougall v Dochree 1992
The accused spied on women who were using sun-beds in leisure center, and was charged with a breach of peace. The crown could use s9 for the similar cases, but although the wonen in that case were negaging in private act, the offence would be committed only if they were in fact naked. Therefore, of there was swimmingwear the section would have not applied
Duffield v Skeen 1981
the accused was arrested for shouting inflammatory political and slogans. (breach of peace use to stop any likelihood of disturbance, however we can see that there is potential infringements post 1998 with the ECHR art 8
Stewart v Lockhart 1990
=> Transvestite in red light district in Aberdeen
=> Police found out the individual was in fact a man
=> Charged as breach of peace
Cardle v Murray 1993
Murray had been breakdancing in shopping centre and in course of dancing, he nearly knocked down and elderly lady. And when police approached him and took his arm, he started resisting and shouting and swearing. Question for court was whether he was being unlawfully detained? If he was being lawfully detained then he would have no right in the way he acted because police would have authority for detaining him. But in this case he was acquitted as the police were unlawful in detaining him which means that he had the right to act in the way he did so he wasn’t actually creating public disorder. Court held dancing in itself is not an offence
Wyness v Lockhart 1992
Accused approached a number of members of public and had offered to shake handswith them and requested for money. This is a begging case. Evidence presented to court included specific evidence from complainers so people he had approached andhe said they were not alarmed or annoyed that he was asking them for money but court still viewed this as breach of peace- This case can be compared to
Donaldson v Vannet 1998
The court came to the opposite conclusion. They said that begging in itself is not a breach of the peace - What would make those two different?- Donaldosn v Vannet made it clear that begging could be a breach of the peace if it was accompanied by aggression. The court said it was an objective test so it had=s tobe conduct that is likely to cause fear or alarm as opposed to that particular complainer being frightened
Young v Heatly 1959
Critical issue was whether or not a breach of the peace can be caused when it takes place in private. There is an automatic assumption that there has to be a public component to it. This case involves someone who had made indecent remarks to individual boys when they were in a room with him. That was prosecuted as a breachof the peace. The court said yes, even though it was taken place in private, were there is a possibility of discovery that it would lead to this alarm in the community then that would be enough
Smith v Donnelly 2001
the court redefined the AR as ‘conduct severe enough to cause alarm to ordinary ppl and threaten seriouss disturbance to the community. The court acknowledge that ‘… there are cases in which a breach of the peace has been held established on grounds which might charitably be described as tenuous’. The court reviewed and opined that the AR of breach of the peace was now defined by reference to 3 cases: Raffaelli v Heatly 1949 JC 101;Ferguson v Carnochan (1889) 16 R (J) 9;Young v Heatyly 1959 JC 66. Pamela Smith was charged on a summary complaint which libelled… The JP held that no devolution issue had been demonstrated and Smith appealed, with leave, to the HCJ where the conviction was upheld.the accused was convicted of a breach of the peace for lying on a roadway, disrupting the traffic
Raffaelli v Heatly 1949
This is an example to disturbance to the
community. In this case, Raffaelli peered through a slit in a window and
there was no innocent interpretation for the repeated peering through
the slit. This is referred to as the peeping Tom case. This is when a
reasonable person might be expected to be alarmed or upset.
Jones v Carnegie 2004
approved Smith; several accused had been convicted of breach of the peace while engaging in various forms of civil disobedience; for instance, one accused, Barrett, had been convicted of behaving in a disorderly manner by sitting on a roadway
Borwick v Urquhart 2003
(conduct commited in private)B supplied alcohol to underage girls, and filmed one of them when they were drunk and showed this video to another party guest. It was held that this was not breach of the peace since it was only the other party guest that was upset by it and it had not caused a disturbance to the community.
Butcher v Jessop 1989
(mens rea) - Footballers playing accused of BotP – argued in defence because wno BotP as within game that there
- Held conduct was objectively calculated to cause disturbance/distress (in the rival team; the accused’s conduct, obejctively as ‘calculated to provoke a disturbance’
Allison v Higson 2004
(mens rea) running on field of play waving flagThe appellant (X) appealed by way of case stated against a conviction of breaching the peace, for which he was charged on summary complaint in the sheriff court. X ran onto the pitch at Ibrox, waving a Union Jack flag, during a Rangers match against a European team. Rangers had just scored the first goal and the spectators were jubilant. At a pre match briefing the police had been instructed to arrest anyone who invaded the pitch. The sheriff repelled a plea of no case to answer and X was convicted after the sheriff found that X’s behaviour could reasonably have been expected to incite others to behave in a disorderly manner and could have led to serious crowd control issues. On appeal, X argued that there was no basis for concluding that his behaviour was conducive to alarm or public disturbance, particularly since it had not been committed in an atmosphere of “tribal animosity”.
Held, dismissing the appeal, that the sheriff was entitled to make the findings that she had. Given the charged atmosphere of a football crowd the risk of crowd trouble was an ever present threat. Although X had acted in front of a jubilant crowd, his actions created a serious risk that others would take the same action.
Hughes v Crowe 1993
playing laud music 7.15 am - 8.15 am on Saturday morningHeld, that where between 7.15 and 8.15 a.m. on a Saturday H had played recorded music and banged on the floor extremely loudly and had sung, played a guitar and used a vacuum cleaner in an upper flat causing distress to the occupants of the flat below, the justice had been entitled to infer mens rea and to hold that his conduct amounted to a breach of the peace taking into account the time of day, the extreme noise and the nature of the accommodation, and that although the justice had erred in refusing to allow H to question a police constable on why he had originally charged another occupant of the flat along with H on the basis that the question was irrelevant, when H had been attempting to challenge the credibility of a material witness, the error did not justify the allegation that there had not been a fair trial when three other witnesses had spoken to the crucial issues of fact in the case.
