Essays - Non Fatal Offences

Question 1

What are the points you need to raise when the essay has a twist?

Answer 1

• Law needs to be justifiable
• Law needs to be able to deal with all types of cases
• Modern society is very different to when these laws were defined.

Question 2

What does it mean that the “Law needs to be justifiable”?

Answer 2

IF the population doesn’t understand the law, then they won’t take that law as necessary and simply won’t follow it.

Question 3

What does it mean when the law needs to “deal with all types of cases”?

Answer 3

The people need to feel like the law understands them.
For instance, case law allows for more specific situations and forms of harm to be covered. Which can include developments like Ireland, Dica and Burstow pt 2. Allowing for the law to deal with more modern issues.

Question 4

What does it mean when it says “modern society is very different to when these laws were defined”?

Answer 4

• To be [the twist of the question] the law needs to modern, clear and inclusive.
  -Can’t have 100-year-old societies telling us what is right or wrong now in the modern day. The law needs to adapt and evolve with society.
• I.E including mental health or different expetions to crimes, like body modifications.
  the OAPA was made in 1861, it has a strong reliance on case law to keep it up to date. (really need a new act with definitions in it).
• However, it takes time as the courts have to wait for cases to come to them.

Question 5

Why are Assualt and Battery misleading terms?

Answer 5

As the public believe they are to do with serious harm

Question 6

Where are Assualt and Battery in statute law?

Answer 6

s.39 Criminal Justice Act

Question 7

Why is the law around A + B confusing to the public?

Answer 7

As they are not defined in law but through case law, instead only their sentencing guidelines are defined in law.

Question 8

How is the law not accessible to the public (A +B)?

Answer 8

As there is no simple defintion and the acts do not clearly outlined where the offences are actually defined

Question 9

Where is A + B actually defined?

Answer 9

In Collins.
A police officer is interviewing a women on the street. She goes to leave, the officer puts his hand on her arm and says “stop”.
The courts said the touch wasn’t necessary and that turned into battery.

Question 10

How does Collins further confuse the law?

Answer 10

As Collins was brought under “common assault” rather than the statute titles of assault and battery, further confusing the law.

Question 11

How does case law confuse the public?

Answer 11

As the public thinks A + B are violent offences, but the cases aren’t. In fact, you can commit assault and battery without even being next to the person
Ireland - calls
Burstow - letters
Smith - acid in the hand dryer and ran away, still battery
Thomas - touching a skirt is battery (not violent)

Question 12

What are the law commission reforms?

Answer 12

to call assualt “threatened assualt” and battery “physical assault” to make the law clearer and more accessible to the public.

Question 13

What are the key points in an ABH essay?

Answer 13

That there is no statutory definition
It has the same sentencing as s.20 GBH
Under- charged

Question 14

Where is ABH kept in statutes?

Answer 14

s.37 Offences Against the Person Act.

Question 15

What does it mean by “No statutory definition”

Answer 15

• The OAPA doesn’t define ABH, ABH is defined through case law.
• However, as it case law definition, it is subjective to the judge on that case as there is no fundamental definition which stops the judges from interpreting the definition to liberally.
  ABH needs to be statutory.

Question 16

What case defined ABH? details

Answer 16

Miller
- It is defined as “any hurt or injury calculated to interfere with the health or comfort of the victim”
- He raped his wife, but that was still legal at the time he committed it, the judge made it a crime in that case.

Question 17

What does it mean when ABH has the same sentencing as s.20 GBH?

Answer 17

It means that both ABH and s.20 GBH have the same sentence of 5 years.
- However, the 2 have different levels of harm. Abh being “some harm” and “really serious or wound” for GBH
It doesn’t follow the ladder principle

Question 18

What is the ladder principle?

Answer 18

When an offence which is more serious has a proportionate sentence.
As the level of harm increases so should the punishment.

Question 19

What did the Law commission proposed to resolve this?

Answer 19

A new sentencing guideline of 5 years for ABH and 7 years for s.20 GBH.
But, no shocker here, the government rejected this

Question 20

What does it mean when ABH is “under charged”?

Answer 20

As ABH is a TEW offence, it can be heard in the mags or crown court.
To save money, ABH may be downplayed and sent to the mags court when it needed to be sent to crown court.
- But justice shouldn’t be based on money. {Good time to talk about twist of the question}

Question 21

What did the law commission recommend to change under charging?

Answer 21

• Make ABH an indictable offence, always to be heard in the crown court, but keep sentence at 5 years
• But to fill the grey area between battery and ABH, implement a new aggravated offence, which is a summary offence, but gives the mags extra powers of sentencing to make up for it being summary.
  I.E make it so aggravated assault is 12 months for 1 offence instead of the usual max of 6 months per offence .
• IMPLEMENTS THE LADDER PRINCIPLE {also talk about the twist of the question}

Question 22

What did the Law commission reccomend overall?

Answer 22

• A new statute for non-fatals, brings them all together.
  Rejected by govt
  But it is clearly vital that needs to be brought together to be clearer, more accessible and modern as they are the most commonly committed offences.

Question 23

What are the key points in GBH essay?

Answer 23

• The same sentence
• Modern cases
• Reforms

Question 24

What does it mean when ABH has the same sentencing as s.20 GBH?

Answer 24

It means that both ABH and s.20 GBH have the same sentence of 5 years.
- However, the 2 have different levels of harm. Abh being “some harm” and “really serious or wound” for GBH
It doesn’t follow the ladder principle

Question 25

What is the ladder principle?

Answer 25

When an offence which is more serious has a proportionate sentence.
As the level of harm increases so should the punishment.

Question 26

What did the Law commission proposed to resolve this?

Answer 26

A new sentencing guideline of 5 years for ABH and 7 years for s.20 GBH.
But, no shocker here, the government rejected this

Question 27

What does it mean by modern cases?

Answer 27

• GBH isn’t up to date, it isn’t modern as it does not include modern forms of harm in a statute.
• Only includes psychiatric harm due to cases
• So to be [enter twist of question] the law needs to be modern by making a new statute with the new forms of harm

Question 28

What cases introduced modern forms of harm?

Answer 28

Eisenhower - developed GBH to include really serious harm as well as a wound.
- Details, someone got shot in the eye with a pellet gun, wasn’t a wound so they made GBH really serious harm
Burstow - made psychiatric harm included under gbh
Letter writer.
Dica - GBH can include biological harm
- He was the STD spreader

Question 29

What are the reforms the Law Commission suggests?

Answer 29

Re-name the offences to make them clearer.
S.20 to be recklessly causing really serious harm
s.18 to be intentionally causing really serious harm
- Also modernising all the offences (conclusion)

Question 30

Did Governemnt accept these reforms for GBH?

Answer 30

Nope, course not, so GBH is still case law dependant.
It is a common crime so case law clarity is vital, but having them spread over so many cases in so many places under decades fo cases, makes the law confusing
[mention twist of the question]

Question 31

What are the key points in an OAPA essay?

Answer 31

• Layout and language
• Modern cases
  -Structure
  Conclusion

Question 32

What does it mean when it says “Layout and language” for OAPA

Answer 32

• OAPA has a complicated structure that is difficult to follow. S. 18 then s.20 (even tho s.20 is a lesser offence), then s.37 for ABH even though it is lesser than s.18 and s.20.
• Uses old-fashioned and out-of-date terminology
• Doesn’t apply to modern circumstances in cases.
• Updating the law has made matters worse

Question 33

What does it mean when an OAPA essay is about “modern cases”

Answer 33

• The law itself does not cover modern forms of harm, like pyschriatric. That is all based on case law.
• Case law has to maintain the offenses modern approach for parliament.

Question 34

What did Chan - Fook state?

Answer 34

Chan-Fook made ABH include psychiatric harm.
As Chan Fook was locked in an upstairs room, fearing violence they jumped out of the window and hurt themselves.

Question 35

What did Burstow state?

Answer 35

It made GBH include psychiatric harm
As burstow wrote the letters making the victim feel vulnerable.

Question 36

What does an OAPA essay mean when it talks about structure?

Answer 36

• The OAPA doesn’t follow the ladder principle, where the more serious the harm is the more serious the punishment should be.
• S. 37 ABH and S.20 GBH have the same sentence of 5 years. Dispite their different levels of harm one being some and the other being really serious.
  Law commission states that there needs to be a Modern and clear Act, as OAPA is no longer cutting it.

Question 37

What is in the conclusion of an OAPA essay?

Answer 37

Recommendations for reforms repeatedly rejected by the Govt.
Which forces the courts to make the law modern and up to date, which leaves the issue open to the subjectivity of the judges. Instead of making the law catch up.
For instance, Using Dica to expand on different forms of ham and moderninsing law, to bring in biological harm (STDs)