Denials of offence

Question 1

Kingston

Answer 1

A drunken intent is still intent

Question 2

Kingston

facts

Answer 2

Y and X hired P to take photos of D to use for blackmail. P invited V (15 year old) to his flat, gave him alcohol and drugs and left him asleep. He then drugged D’s coffee and encouraged him to assault V as he slept. D did so. Held: a drunken intent is still intent.

Question 3

Intoxication rules requirements

Answer 3

1) D’s intoxication is voluntary
2) D’s offence at T2 must have been of basic intent not specific intent
3) D’s intoxicant at T1 must have been ‘dangerous’
4) D must lack mens rea at T2 because of that intoxication

Question 4

Allen

Answer 4

Involuntary intoxication

D committed buggery and assult. He lacked mens rea (he claimed he was not acting voluntarily) because he had consumed a large amount of wine, he claimed it was involuntary intoxication because he did not realise the strength. Held: D’s intoxication was voluntary.

Question 5

Aitken

Answer 5

Where D’s offence is a basic offence and lacks mens rea due to voluntary intoxication, she is liable for offence

Question 6

Davies

Answer 6

Where D’s offence is a specific offence and lacks mens rea due to voluntary intoxication, she is not liable for offence.

Question 7

Majewski

Answer 7

Offences which can be satisfied by recklessness are basic intent, those requiring intention are specific intent.

Lord Simon however, discusses a test based on intention as to consequences, but this cannot be right with murder as it can be committed without intention to kill (i.e. GBH).

Question 8

Heard

Answer 8

Whilst drunk, D exposed his penis and rubbed it on a police officer’s leg. D claimed to lack mens rea due to intoxication (lack of intentional touching). Held: guilty.

1) Sexual assault is a basic intent offence, despite mens rea of intentional touching
2) Implication =all sexual offences are basic inten where D’s mens rea relates solely to D’s intentional contact with V and her non-consent.

3) Alternative test for basic and specific intent offences = ulterior intent.
Hughes thought that any offence requiring ulterior mens rea will be one of specific intent. But this would mean murder was a basic intent as does not require ulterior intent.

Question 9

O’Connor

Answer 9

Austria has rejected the Majewski distinction

Question 10

Basic intent/specific intent offences?

Beard

Answer 10

Manslaughter = basic intent

Question 11

Basic intent/specific intent offences?

Aitken

Answer 11

Wounding or causing GBH (s20) = basic intent

Question 12

Basic intent/specific intent offences?

Majewski

Answer 12

Assult and battery

= basic intennt

Question 13

Basic intent/specific intent offences?

Grout

Answer 13

Rape = basic intent

Question 14

Basic intent/specific intent offences?

Heard

Answer 14

Sexual assault = basic intent

Question 15

Basic intent/specific intent offences?

Caldwell

Answer 15

Criminal damage = basic intent

Question 16

Basic intent/specific intent offences?

Beard

Answer 16

Murder = specific intent

Question 17

Basic intent/specific intent offences?

Davies

Answer 17

Wounding or causing GBH with intent (s18)

= specific intent

Question 18

Basic intent/specific intent offences?

Majewski

Answer 18

Theft and robbery = specific intent

Question 19

Gallagher

Answer 19

Dutch courage = D becomes intoxicated at T1 in order to commit specific offence

Where D lacks mens rea for specific intent offence, D’s intoxication cannot replace her lack of mens rea, so no liability for that offence. However, where there is dutch courage, where D becomes intoxicated at T1 in order to commit the specific offence at T2. He will be liable

Question 20

Gallagher facts

Answer 20

D decided to kill his wife. D drank most of the bottle and then killed her. Held: guilty, but because intoxicated mens rea is still mens rea.

BUT D must have gotten drunk IN ORDER TO kill V.

Question 21

Lipman

Answer 21

Drugs such as LSD are commonly known to be dangerous.

Question 22

Bailey

Answer 22

Where intoxicant consumed is not commonly known and D does not personally know, D’s prior fault will not be sufficient substitute for the mens rea of basic intent at T2.

Diabetic failed to take sufficient food after insulin and committed an attack.

Question 23

Hardie

Answer 23

Intoxicant consumed was not commonly known or known to D.

D took valium tablets to calm himself down. D returned, intoxicated by tablets and set fire to wardrobe. Held: Valium was not a dangerous drug, and D had no reason to believe it would lead to the actions

Question 24

Richardson and Irwin

Answer 24

D must lack mens rea BECAUSE of the intoxication.

D must have foreseen the risk if sober. It is subjective.

Question 25

Hatton

Answer 25

In cases of intoxication and self defence, the gladstone Williams authority becomes ignored. And D’s (if honest belief) will be disregarded if based on an intoxicated mistake.

Intoxicated, D killed V. D raised self-defence thaat he thought V had attacked him with a stick that he thought was a sword. Held: he could not rely on his intoxicated mistake.

Exception - Jaggard v Dickinson

Question 26

Jaggard v Dickinson

Answer 26

D told by X to use his house. Returning home drunk, D mistakenly tried to enter an identical house. D broke her way in and raised defence that she believed that the house belonged to X and he would have consented. Held: D may use defence even if her belief was based on intoxicated mistake.

Question 27

AG’s Reference (No4 of 2000)

Answer 27

Where D acts voluntarily, even if her conduct was influenced by external factors, automatism will not be found.

Question 28

Coley

Answer 28

Irrational or erratic voluntariness is still voluntariness.

There must be a “complete destruction of voluntary control”.

Question 29

What is the burden for automatism?

Answer 29

There is an evidential burden for D, if she wants to raise automatism, to provide some evidence of involuntariness.

Question 30

Bratty

Answer 30

No act is punishable if done involuntarily, involuntary means - an act done by the muscles without any control by the mind.

Question 31

Broome v Perkins

Answer 31

Automatic state interpreted narrowly

D (diabetic) failed to take sufficient food after injection of insulin, whilst in a trace state, he drove erratically and collided with another car. Held: guilty because the fact he was able to coordinate his movements to drive, even though impeded meant that he was not fully in an autatic state.

Question 32

AG’s Reference (No 2 of 1992)

Answer 32

Confirmed the extremely narrow definition of automatism.

Only a “total destruction of voluntary control” will suffice.

Question 33

Coley

Answer 33

There is a narrow view of loss of voluntary control in non driving case.

Irrational behaviour with a deluded or disordered mind is not wholly involuntary action.

Question 34

Bailey

Answer 34

Prior fault

D will only have sufficient prior fault where she has SUBJECTIVELY foreseen at T1 the potential for involuntariness at T2.

Contrast Quick

Question 35

Quick

Answer 35

Prior fault

D will have fault is she OBJECTIVELY should have foreseen the risks.

This is subject to academic criticism.

Question 36

Ryan

Answer 36

Australian case supports the Quick decision.

Question 37

M’Naghten rules

Answer 37

1) D must suffer from a disease of the mind
2) Causing a defect of reason
3) This must have caused a lack of responsibility either because:
1) D did not know the nature or quality of her act
2) She did not know it was wrong

Question 38

Kemp

Answer 38

Disease of the mind is a legal question not medical even were no degeneration of brain cells.

Question 39

Quick

Answer 39

D was a diabetic and hurt someone due to a lack of food after insulin. Held: the state was externally caused.

Question 40

Hennessy

Answer 40

D was diabetic and went into a coma induced by lack of insulin. Held: the condition was internally caused, D could rely on insanity rules or change his plea to guilty - which he did.

Question 41

Sullivan

Answer 41

Epileptics are treated as insanee

Question 42

Burgess

Answer 42

Sleepwalkers are treated as insane.

Question 43

Rabey

Canadian case

Answer 43

D became infatuated with V, discovered she was not interested and reacted by hitting her. Court held: that “the common stresses and disappointments of life do not constitute an external cause”.

Question 44

T

Answer 44

D took part in a robbery. D had been raped at some point prior to the robbery. D was acting in a dissociative state. Held: D’s conduct was not fully involuntary here but a psychological blow can be an external cause.

Question 45

Lowe

Answer 45

Law applied at crown court level has increasingly failed to apply the rules set down by appellate courts in favour of a more commonsense approach (i.e. allowing automatism to run in sleep walking cases).

Question 46

Clarke

Answer 46

Causing a defect in reason

D took articles from a shop without paying, she did this absent-mindedly due to depression. Held:
Short periods of absent-mindedness fell far short of amounting to a defect of reason.

Question 47

Sullivan

Answer 47

Causing a lack of responsibility limb 1. D needs to not know what he was doing.

Question 48

B

Answer 48

Causing a lack of responsibility limb 1.

D, a schizophrenic had sex with his wife (without consent), believing he had sexual healing powers. Court considered what would happen if he believed she was consenting. Held : he would be guilty.

Question 49

Windle

Answer 49

Causing a lack of responsibility limb 2

D’s wife was mentally ill. D killed his wife and told the police “I suppose they will hang me for this”. Held: guilty.

D may think what he is doing is morally right but legally wrong so insanity will not apply.

Question 50

Stapleton

Answer 50

Austrialian courts have refused to follow Windle.

Question 51

Automatism Requirments

Answer 51

1) Involuntary
2) Caused externally
3) Prior fault
4) Basic intent

Question 52

Insanity requirments

Answer 52

1) Disease of mind (internal)
2) Causing a defect of reason
3) Disease of mind cause her not to know the nature or quality or she did not know that it was wrong.
4) prior fault?

Question 53

Coley

Answer 53

Disease of the mind

D suffered psychotic episode following cannabis. D attacked neighbour. He was acting as a role out of a computer game. Held: this was voluntary intoxication not disease of the mind.

Question 54

Harris

Answer 54

D binged drank for several days. He then took time to sober up before returning to work. After several days he set fire to his home, charged with arson. His defence was not of intoxication, as sober at the time of house fire but of insanity based on disease of the mind caused by alcohol abuse. Held: disease of the mind.

Question 55

Mcghee

Answer 55

In Automatism there must be a “complete destruction of voluntary control”.

Question 56

R v Ryan

Answer 56

D with one hand pointed a loaded shotgun at V whom he had robbed, while the other hand tried to tie V up. D was startled and he ‘involuntarily’ pressed the trigger because of the reflex action. Held: tihs may be involuntary in the dictionary sense. However, it was one for which he was responsible in law and not properly analogous to an act done in convulsions or an epileptic seizure.