General Principles: Elements and Capacity Cases Flashcards
(9 cards)
- Bratty v AG for Northern Ireland AC 386
o Context: Emphasises that the Actus Reus must be willed or voluntary. Also provides a definition of “disease of the mind” for the defence of Insanity.
o Principle/Details: Lord Denning stated that the requirement of a voluntary act is essential in every criminal case. For insanity, he defined “disease of the mind” as “any mental disorder which manifests itself in violence and is prone to recur”.
- R v White 2 KB 124
o Context: A foundational case for establishing factual causation.
o Principle/Details: Introduced the “but for” test: the consequence would not have occurred but for the defendant’s act or omission. The defendant poisoned his mother’s drink intending to kill her, but she died of a heart attack unconnected to the poison. He was not guilty of murder because her death would have happened anyway (“but for” his act, she would still have died).
- Dalloway (1847) 2 Cox 273
o Context: Illustrates the requirement for legal causation that the consequence must be attributable to a culpable act.
o Principle/Details: If the prohibited consequence would have occurred regardless of the defendant’s negligent act, their act is not the legal cause. A negligent horse carriage driver was not held liable for a child’s death because the child would have been killed even if the driver had not been negligent.
- R v G UKHL 50
o Context: A significant case establishing the subjective test for recklessness.
o Principle/Details: The test is whether the defendant himself foresaw the risk and went ahead anyway, not whether a reasonable person would have foreseen the risk. Held that it is unjust to convict a defendant based on what someone else would have apprehended if the defendant had no such apprehension.
- Sweet v Parsley AC 132
o Context: Strongly upholds the presumption that mens rea is required for a criminal offence, even if the statute creating the offence is silent on the matter.
o Principle/Details: Held that “whenever a section is silent as to mens rea, there is a presumption that… we must read in words appropriate to require mens rea”. The defendant, a teacher, was not guilty of managing premises used for smoking cannabis when she was unaware students she sublet to were smoking there.
- Cundy v Le Cocq (1884) 13 QBD 207
o Context: Illustrates how the statutory context can indicate Parliament’s intention to create a strict liability offence.
o Principle/Details: Where mens rea words are used in some sections of a statute but are conspicuously absent from the section under consideration, this may suggest that section was intended to be one of strict liability. This case involved selling liquor to a drunk person where the statute was silent on knowledge, unlike other sections.
- M’Naghten (1843) 10 Cl & F 200
o Context: Enunciates the fundamental rules for the common law defence of Insanity.
o Principle/Details: To establish insanity, it must be proved that at the time of the act, the defendant was suffering from a disease of the mind causing a defect of reason, such that they either did not know the nature and quality of their act or, if they did know it, did not know that what they were doing was legally wrong.
- DPP v Kent and Sussex Contractors Ltd KB 146
o Context: A key case applying the Principle of Identification to establish Corporate Criminal Liability where mens rea is required.
o Principle/Details: The court identifies a person (or persons) within the company structure who is the “directing mind and will” of the corporation. Their mens rea is then attributed to the company. In this case, the intent of senior managers was deemed the intent of the company.
