Chapter 10 key cases (Mental capacity defences)

Question 1

M’Naghten (1843)?

Answer 1

• The defendant suffered from extreme paranoia.
• He thought he was being persecuted by the ‘Tories’ (the then government).
• He tried to kill a member of the government but instead killed his secretary.
• Due to his mental state, he was found not guilty of murder.

Question 2

Loake v DPP (2017)?

Answer 2

• The defendant was separated from her husband and was charged with harassment after sending a large number of text messages to him.
• The question was available whether the defence of insanity

Question 3

R v Clarke (1972)?

Answer 3

• The defendant went into a supermarket and picked up items without paying.
• She was charged with theft.
• She claimed in her defence that she lacked the men’s rea for theft as she had no recollection of putting the items in her bag.
• She said she was suffering from absent-mindedness.
• The trial judge said this amounted to a plea of insanity.
• So she pleaded to theft and appealed later.

Question 4

R v Kemp (1956)?

Answer 4

• The defendant was suffering from hardening of the arteries.
• This inferred with his brain which led to loss of consciousness.
• During one of these moments he attacked his wife with a hammer, causing serious injuries.
• He admitted that he was suffering from ‘defect of reason’ but said this was not due to a ‘disease of the mind’ as it was a physical illness causing the problem not a mental illness.

Question 5

R v Hennessy (1989)?

Answer 5

• The defendant was a diabetic who hadn’t taken his insulin in 3 days.
• He drove a stolen car, and was charged with taking a motor vehicle without consent, his driving was also disqualified.
• He had no recollection of this.
• The judge ruled that he was putting forward a defence of insanity.
• He then pleaded guilty and appealed on the ground that he should have been allowed to put forward the defence of non-insane automatism.

Question 6

R v Burgess (1991)?

Answer 6

• The defendant and his girlfriend had been watching videos.
• They both fell asleep and, in his sleep, attacked her.
• It was due to an internal cause (a sleep disorder).
• The judge ruled that this evidence was found ‘not guilty by reason of insanity’.
• The court of appeal agreed with this rather than the defence of automatism.

Question 7

R v Oye (2013)?

Answer 7

• The police were called at a cafe where the defendant was behaving oddly.
• He threw something at the police and was arrested and taken to the police station.
• When the police moved him to the custody suite, he punched her and broke her jaw.
• He was charged with assault occasioning actual bodily harm and two charges of affray.
• His defence was that the victim had a demonic face.
• Medical evidence at the trial showed that he had a psychotic episode.
• This resulted in the verdict of him not being guilty by reason of insanity.

Question 8

R v Quick (1973)?

Answer 8

• The defendant was a diabetic who had taken his insulin but had not eaten enough food.
• This caused him to have low blood sugar levels which affected his brain.
• He was a nurse at a mental hospital and assaulted a patient.
• The court ruled that his condition did not come within the definition of insanity, which meant the correct defence was automatism.

Question 9

R v T (1990)?

Answer 9

• The defendant stabbed her victim and leaned her victims car to take her bag.
• The medical evidence was that she was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder after being raped 3 days earlier.
• This was viewed as arising from external sources so was sufficient for the defence of automatism.

Question 10

R v Coley (2013)?

Answer 10

• The defendant had been taking cannabis which led him to attach his neighbours.
• As well as arguing the defence of insanity, the defendant argued automatism.
• The court dismissed this argument as he was not acting wholly involuntarily and he had induced his condition by voluntary intoxication.

Question 11

R v Bailey (1983)?

Answer 11

• The defendant was a diabetic who had failed to eat enough after taking his insulin to control his diabetes.
• he went to sort out matters between himself and his ex-lovers’s new boyfriend.
• After asking for some sugar and water, he became aggressive and hit the victim over the head with an iron bar.
• He was charged with s 18 OAPA 1861.

Question 12

R v Coley (2013)?

Answer 12

• The defendant was a regular user of cannabis and one night watched a violent video game.
• Later that night he entered a neighbour’s house and attacked her and her partner.
• When arrested he was calling his mother and threatening suicide.
• He said he blacked out and could not remember anything.
• He was convicted of murder as his state of mind was caused by voluntary intoxication and therefore it was not a case of insanity.

Question 13

R v Lipman (1970)?

Answer 13

• The defendant and his girlfriend took LSD.
• While they were tripping, the defendant stuffed a sheet down her throat as he thought he was fighting a snake.
• He was charged with his girlfriend’s murder and with unlawful act manslaughter.

Question 14

DPP v Majewski (1977)?

Answer 14

• The defendant consumed large quantities of alcohol and drugs and then attacked the landlord of the pub where he was drinking.
• He also attacked the police officers who tried to arrest him and damaged the pub and the police station where he was taken.
• All the offences he was charged with were basic intent offences.
• The defendant had claimed no memory of what he had done.

Question 15

R v Kingston (1994)?

Answer 15

• The defendant was invited to a house where his drink was drugged by a man who wanted to blackmail him.
• He was then shown a 15 year old boy who was drugged and unconscious in the room, and was invited to abuse him.
• The defendant who had pedophile tendencies, did so and was photographed by the blackmailer.
• He was convicted of indecent assault.

Question 16

R v O’Grady (1987)?

Answer 16

• After the defendant and the victim had been drinking heavily, they fell asleep.
• The defendant claimed that he awoke to find the victim hitting him, so he picked up a glass ashtray and hit the victim with it and went back to sleep.
• When he woke up the next morning, he found that his friend was dead.
• On a charge of manslaughter, the court said a defendant is a not entitled to rely, so far as self-defence is concerned, upon a mistake of fact which has been induced by voluntary intoxication.

Question 17

R v Hatton (2005)?

Answer 17

• The defendant had drink over twenty pints of beer.
• He and the victim went back to the defendants flat.
• In the morning he claimed he found the victim dead from injuries caused by a sledgehammer.
• He said he could not really remember what had happened but thought the victim had hit with a five-foot-long stick and he had defended himself.
• He was convicted of murder.