Gross negligence manslaughter Flashcards
Adomako - Elements of GNM
- D must owe V a duty of care
- D must breach that duty
- D’s breach must cause V’s death
- D must have been grossly negligent
- Duty
Can be proven with a duty of care (Donoghue v Stevenson) created duty of care
Caparo v Dickman
Test for duty of care:
1. Damage (Harm) to V must be reasonable foreseeable (Jolley v Sutton)
- There must a proximity between V and D (Osman v Ferguson; Bourhill v Young) either through relationship or time and space
- It must be fair, just and reasonable to impose a duty of care on D (Hill v Chief constable of south yorkshire police)
- OR through a criminal duty to act
Duty to act situations only apply when there is an omission
Relationship - Gibbins and Proctor
Voluntarily assuming responsibility - Stone and Dobinson
Contractual - R v Pittwood
Public office - R v Dytham
Creating a dangerous situation - R v Miller
Voluntary assumption of care
Criminal law - assumption of care must be significant for D to be held responsible for omission.
Normally where D and V are in a relationship or in a particular situation and D has WILLINGLY and ACTIVELY taken over care of V.
It isn’t ENOUGH to make a person criminally responsible if all they are trying to do is help or do the right thing e.g. Calling emergency services.
R v Evans
The assumption of care/responsibility must be significant for D to be held responsible for his omission.
Ex turpi causa
Means when parties are involved in a joint venture to commit a crime, they don’t owe a duty of care to each other.
If D and V are embarking upon an illegal activity they will still owe a duty of care to each other for the purposes of gross negligence.
Ex turpi causa does not apply to criminal law.
Wacker
There can be a duty even though D is committing an illegal act.
D and V involved in transporting illegal immigrants into the country.
- Breach of duty (involving risk of death)
Breach of duty means that D has fallen below the standard of behaviour expected of a reasonable person.
Blyth v Birmingham waterworks
Defines BofD as:
Not doing something the reasonable man would do, or doing something the reasonable man wouldn’t do.
Nettleship v Weston
Inexperience doesn’t lower the standard of care expected of D
Bolam
Standard of care raised due to profession - if D has particular skills, he will be judged against a reasonable person with the same skills/ expertise.
Mullins v Richards
Age lowers standard of care - children will be judged against reasonable person of the same age.
Risk factors
Important when proving breach.
Size of Risk
How likely is harm to happen?
Bolton v Stone - Small risk of harm = lower standard of care expected.
Miller v Jackson - Bigger risk of harm = higher standard of care expected.
Seriousness of potential harm
How serious will harm be if it happens?
Paris v Stepney - Potential harm could be serious = higher standard of care.
Ds knew C was blind on one eye if the other eye were to be damaged then it would result in a very serious injury.
Practicability of precautions
How easily could D have taken precautions to reduce risk?
Latimer v AEC - Precautions taken must correspond with risk = more/ better precautions expected.
Risk lowered as D had taken reasonable steps by spreading sawdust on spillage.
Haley v LEB - Only precaution taken i.e leaving hammer there was insufficient for blind population - the reasonable person would have done more.
Benefits of taking risk
What stands to be gained from D taking a risk?
Watt v HCC - Benefit bigger than the risk = lower standard of care
as lower risk outweighed by the need to save a life.
The breach must also involve a risk of death
Misra and Srivastava
Confirmed need for there to be a risk of death.
Lewin
Decided that the reasonable person would not have realised there was a risk of death by leaving V in the car.
- The breach must cause the death
Factual causation - But for test (Pagett)
Legal causation - Operative and Substantial test (Smith)
The chain will be broken if there’s an intervening act:
- Victims own actions (Williams)
- Actions of a third party (Jordan)
- Act of God (e.g. Tsunami)
Think skull rule does not break the chain (Blaue)
Gross negligence
Adomako - Confirmed that the test for the ‘gross’ part of GNM and stressed that the question was a matter for the jury to decide.
Test : D’s conduct is SO BAD as to amount to a criminal act/ omission.
