Causation

Question 1

What is the difference between ‘result’ and ‘conduct’ crimes?

Answer 1

• ‘Result’ = no liability unless the result was caused by D’s act//omission (i.e., dead bodies for manslaughter)
• ‘Conduct’ = the offence is the act itself (i.e., fraud by false representation)

Question 2

What elements are involved in causation? (Two-part process)

Answer 2

• Factual causation
• Legal causation

Question 3

In short, what is factual causation?

Answer 3

Defendant’s actions/omissions must have played a role to bringing a specific outcome.

Question 4

What does it mean when the court claims that something is ‘substantial’?

Answer 4

• D’s act not the sole/main cause of the result
• D’s acts/omissions are more negligible or minimal (Hughes [2013] UKSC 56) —> a degree to blame

Question 5

Example: causing death while driving uninsured (Road Traffic Act 1988). In an extreme scenario, why would one claim that there is some fault in the driver if they cause death while driving uninsured?

Answer 5

• If not, the driver will not be convicted of uninsured driving
• This would be known as ‘blameworthy’ instead

Question 6

How can you break the chain of causation?

Answer 6

• Subsequent actions of defendant
• The actions of the victim
• Natural events
• Actions/omissions of a third party

Question 7

Provide hypothetical situations for intervention from defendant and intervention from natural acts.

Answer 7

• Defendant: D shoots V, then visits V in hospital and inadvertently infects V with fatal disease (passing disease breaks chain of causation, not shooting itself)
• Natural acts: D attacks V, leaves V injured, V killed by bolt of lighting (lightning breaks chain, D is not liable if natural event is not reasonable foreseeable)

Question 8

What happens to D if there is intervention from V?

Answer 8

• D not liable if V’s subsequent conduct in response is not within a range of responses regarded as reasonable or foreseeable (i.e., was V’s act ‘daft’ or ‘wholly disproportionate’ to D’s act? If so, this will break the chain)
• Consider subjectivity of each v (age, mental capacity, intoxication etc.)

Question 9

What is the ‘eggshell skull’ rule?

Answer 9

• D must ‘take it I’m as he finds him’ -> taking liability for any serious consequences
• D shouldn’t rely on how they were unaware of the victim’s conditions (V’s vulnerability does not break chain)

Question 10

When can Acts of third parties break the chain of causation?

Answer 10

• If action is free, deliberate and informed
• Provides immediate cause of the vent in question
• Action doesn’t need to be precisely accurate
• Example: D is convicted for using his girlfriend as a shield from shooting police and therefore doesn’t break chain

Question 11

Can Medical Intervention break the chain of causation?

Answer 11

• Misdiagnosis/wrong treatment are generally foreseeable and do not break the chain
• Breaks chain only if condition is unforeseeably bad and the sole significant cause of death/injury with D is charged