Mens Rea - Cases Flashcards
Thabo Meil (1954) 1 All ER 373, PC (South Africa)
D and accomplices took V to a hut and beat him over the head intending to kill him. They rolled his body over a cliff to make the death appear accidental. In fact, the victim survived both the beating and the fall from the cliff, but died from exposure shortly afterwards.
Principle – Actus and mens were present throughout; no need to separate them, there was a causal link. Where the actus reus consists of a series of linked acts, it is enough that the mens rea existed at some time during that series, even if not necessarily at the time of the particular act which caused the death.
Lord Reid:
“[It is] … impossible to divide up what was really one series of acts in this way. There is no doubt that the accused set out to do all these acts in order to achieve their plan, and as parts of their plan; and it is much too refined a ground of judgment to say that, because they were under a misapprehension at one stage and thought that their guilty purpose had been achieved before, in fact, it was achieved, therefore they are to escape the penalties of the law.”
Guilty of murder
Church (1966) 2 All ER 72
D took V (a married woman) to a van for sexual purposes. V mocked D and slapped him D knocked V unconscious. Unable to revive her he panicked and threw her into a river. V drowned.
Principle – A defendant will be liable if the entire incident viewed as a whole could be viewed as a ‘series of events’ designed to cause death or GBH. The elements of the offence will be satisfied provided the actus reus and mens rea occur somewhere during a single transaction.
Edmund Davies:
‘an unlawful act causing the death of another cannot, simply because it is an unlawful act, render a manslaughter verdict inevitable. For such a verdict inexorably to follow, the unlawful act must be such as all sober and reasonable people would inevitably recognise must subject the other person to, at least, the risk of some harm resulting therefrom, albeit not serious harm.’”A grosser case of criminal negligence it would be difficult to imagine.”
Guilty of manslaughter.
R v Miller (1983) 2 All ER 427
D a vagrant was sleeping in a building, and fell asleep on his mattress. When he woke up, he saw that his cigarette had caused the mattress to smoulder. Instead of calling for help, just moved into another room. The fire flared up and spread.
Principle – He was convicted of arson, not for starting the fire but for failing to do anything about it.Lord Diplock:”…I see no rational ground for excluding from conduct capable of giving rise to criminal liability, conduct which consists of failing to take measures that lie within one’s power to counteract a danger that one has oneself created, if at the time of such conduct one’s state of mind is such as constitutes a necessary ingredient of the offence. I venture to think that the habit of lawyers to talk of “actus reus,” suggestive as it is of action rather than inaction, is responsible for any erroneous notion that failure to act cannot give rise to criminal liability in English law.”
Guilty of arson (criminal damage by fire)
Fagan v Metropolitan Police Commissioner (1969) 3 All ER 442, DC
D accidently stopped his car on a policeman’s foot but then refused to move when he realised this. He appealed against his conviction for assaulting a police officer in the execution of his duty on the basis that at the time of the actus reus (when his car made contact with the policeman’s foot) he had no mens rea (because it was accidental) and by the time he formed mens rea (refusing to move) there was no act upon which to base liability (he merely refused to undo that which had already been done)
Principle – It was held that the actus reus of assault (in the sense of a battery) came into being when contact was first made between the car and the policeman’s foot. This actus reus continued for the whole time that the car remained on the foot, only ending when the car was moved. At the point in time that the defendant became aware of the contact and refused to move, he developed the requisite mens rea and liability was complete.
Guilty
