Murder

Question 1

DJ Lanham

Answer 1

‘A crime consists of AR, MR and an absence of defences’

Question 2

AR of murder - Coke

Answer 2

• Unlawful
• Killing (causation)
• Reasonable person
• Under the queens peace

Question 3

R v Girdler

Answer 3

• The appropriate model of causation is dependent on the circumstances, common sense, and previous case law

Question 4

R v White

Answer 4

• Factual causation

- Poisoned mother, but actually died of a heart attack. Did not factually cause her death

Question 5

R v Dyson

Answer 5

• Patient was dying of menigitis but wounds inflicted meant he died sooner
• There was factual causation here

Question 6

What can legal causation be divided into?

Answer 6

• Specific factors

- General factors

Question 7

R v Dalloway

Answer 7

• No culpable act as death could not be averted

Question 8

R v Marchant

Answer 8

• No culpability where fault in not covering the prongs of a fork lift truck resulted in death of victim, as blunt force would have caused death anyway

Question 9

R v benge

Answer 9

• Act need not be the only cause

Question 10

R v Smith

Answer 10

• Act of 3rd party (med neg)
• D’s act needs to be the operating and substantial cause of death
• No causation where subsequent act makes the original cause a ‘part of history’
• Stabbed in a fight in army barracks, received inappropriate treatment however wound was still operating and substantial cause

Question 11

R v Jordan

Answer 11

• Example of NAI of medical negligence

- Pneumonia from inappropriate treatment

Question 12

R v Cheshire

Answer 12

NAI which is so potent to make the original act insigificant

Question 13

R v Pagett

Answer 13

• Act of a 3rd party will only break the chain where it is a free, deliberate and informed act
• In R v Pagett the act of shooting the girlfriend was not a free act as it was for the reasonable purpose of self-preservation

Question 14

R v Kimsey

Answer 14

• Substantial means more than trifling

- A trifling act will not break the chain of causation

Question 15

R v Holland

Answer 15

• Refusal treatment does not break the chain causation

- A death where the wound is still the operating and substantial cause the D will still be liable for

Question 16

R v Blaue

Answer 16

• Jehova’s witness who refused treatment
• D still liable as no obligation to get treatment so the chain of causation was not broken. Wound still the operating and substantial cause of death

Question 17

R v Mackie

Answer 17

• Harm from fright or flight will not break the chain of causation where the act is reasonable and foreseeable
• Toddler ran away from assault and fell down the stairs.
• Not an NAI

Question 18

R v Roberts

Answer 18

Jumping from a moving car to avoid rap was reasonable and foreseeable

Question 19

R v Williams and Davies

Answer 19

• Reasonableness of the decision will be considered in the ‘agony of the moment’
• Jumped from car to avoid mugging

Question 20

R v Hayward

Answer 20

• Thin skull rule
• Take the victim as you find them
• Liable for full extent of harm
• Knowledge of susceptibiltiy is irrelevant

Question 21

R v Dear

Answer 21

• Suicide where the V reopens the wound does not break the chain
• If original wound is still the operating and substantial cause, then re-opening the wound will not break the chain.

Question 22

MR of murder

Answer 22

• Malice aforethought;
  - Intention to kill
  - Intention to inflict GBH (R v Vickers)

Question 23

R v Saunders

Answer 23

GBH is serious harm

Question 24

R v Maloney

Answer 24

Intention should be given its ordinary meaning

Question 25

DPP v Chandler

Answer 25

Motive can be evidence of intent but is not intent itself

Question 26

R v Thabo-Meli

Answer 26

- MR and AR must co-occur | - AR judged to be a continuing event so MR was judged to occur at some point during this series of events

Question 27

R v Poulton

Answer 27

Not murder if child still in womb | Not a reasonable person in being