Day 2: Serious Assaults Flashcards
Wounding with Intent (1)
Section and Elements
Section 188 (1)
- With intent to cause GBH
- To any person
- Wounds, maims, disfigures or causes GBH
- To any person
Wounding with Intent (2)
Section and Elements
Section 188 (2)
- With intent to injure any
person or - With reckless disregard
for the safety of others - Wounds, maims,
disfigures or causes GBH - To any person
Intent meaning:
Intent means that act must be done deliberately. More than involuntary or accidental
GBH meaning:
Harm that is really serious
Maims meaning:
Deprive the victim of the use of a limb or one of the senses. Needs to be some degree of permanence.
Disfigures meaning:
To deform or deface; to mar or alter the figure or appearance of a person
Doctrine of transferred malice:
Not necessary that the person suffering the harm was the intended victim. He is still criminally responsible under the doctrine of transferred malice, despite the wrong target being struck.
R v Taisalika
Intent
The nature if the blow and the gash it produced point strongly to the presence of the necessary intent
R v Collister
Intent
Circumstantial evidence from which an offenders intent may be inferred can include:
- the offenders actions and words before, during and after the event
- the surrounding circumstances
- the nature of the act itself
DPP V SMITH
GBH
‘Bodily harm’ need no explanation and ‘grievous’ means no more and no less than ‘really serious’
R v Waters
Wound
A wound is a ‘breaking of the skin evidenced by the flow of blood. May be internal or external.
R v Rapana and Murray
Disfigure
Disfigure covers not only permanent damage but also temporary damage.
R v Mcarthur
Bodily Harm
‘Bodily Harm’ includes any hurt or injury calculated to interfere with the health or comfort of the victim. It need not be permanent but must be more than transitory and trifling.
Cameron V R
Recklessness
Recklessness is establish if:
(a) the defendant recognised that there was a real possibility that:
(i) his or her actions would bring about the proscribed result; and/or
(ii) that the proscribed circumstances existed; and
(b) having regard to that risk those actions were unreasonable
R v Tipple
Recklessness
Recklessness requires that the offender know of, or have a conscious appreciation of the relevant risk, and it may be said that it requires “a deliberate decision to run the risk”
What must be proved when recklessness is an element in an offence??
1) A subjective risk.
The defendant consciously and deliberately ran a risk
2) An objective risk (based on whether a reasonable person would have known the risk)
That the risk was one that was unreasonable to take in the circumstances as they were known to the defendant
Injuring with intent (1)
Section and elements
Section 189 (1)
- With intent to cause GBH
- To any person
- Injures
- Any person
Injures meaning:
Actual bodily harm
Injuring with intent (2)
Section and Elements
Section 189 (2)
- With intent to injure any person or
- With reckless disregard for the safety of others
- injures
- any person
Aggravated Wounding
Section and Elements
Section 191 (1)
- With intent
(a) to commit or facilitate the commission of any imprisonable offence; or
(b) to avoid the detection of himself or of any other person in the commission of any imprisonable offence; or
(c) to avoid the arrest or facilitate the flight of himself or of any other person upon the commission or attempted commission of any imprisonable offence
- wounds, maims, disfigures, causes GBH to any person, stupefies, renders unconscious any person, by any violent means renders any person incapable of resistance
- any person
Stupefies meaning:
to induce a state of stupor, to make stupid, groggy or insensible, to dull the senses or faculties
Violent means in regards to aggravated wounding:
Not limited to physical violence and may include threats of violence, depending on circumstances
R v Crossan
Incapable of resistance
Includes a powerless of will as well as physical incapacity
R v Sturm
Stupefy
Stupefy means to cause an effect on the mind or nervous system of a person which really seriously interferes with that persons mental or physical ability to act in any way which might hinder an intended crime