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Elements of a crimeActus Reus Mens rea Crime
Actus Reus
Causation
Voluntary, positive, unlawful Legal Causation and
act (Hill v Baxter) factual causation
Omissions- where duty is owed
a. Relationship (Gibbons v
Proctor)
b. Statute
c. Prior conduct/ chain of events
(Miller case)
d. Public office (Dytham case)
e. Contract (Pitttwood)
1.Voluntary/positive unlawful act
Hill v Baxter (1958)
The defendant was bitten by a swarm of bees and lost control of the car he was
driving. He claimed he had been overcome by an unknown illness and had been
unconscious. – guilty
Held: some credible evidence must support a claim of sudden illness or concussion,
they said, usually going beyond D’s mere assertion, but (Lord Goddard CJ
dissenting) the burden of proof thereafter is on the prosecution to show that the act
was a voluntary one
Bratty v Attorney-General of
Northern Ireland (1963) AC 386
Lord Denning:
‘The requirement that [the act of the accused] should be a voluntary act is
essen- tial … in every criminal case. No act is punishable if it is done involuntarily.’
, Defense: Automatism
Bratty (1963)
Automatism was defined as ‘an act done by the muscles without any control by the
mind, such as a spasm, a reflex action or a convulsion: or an act done by a
person who is not conscious of what he is doing, such as an act done whilst
suffering from concussion or whilst sleep-walking’
Insane automatism (internal) sane automatism (external)
the cause of the automatism is a where such a defend succeeds, it is
disease of the mind within the a complete defence and the
M’Naghten Rules. In such a case defendant is not guilty
the defence is insanity and the
verdict is not guilty by reason of
insanity
Lord Diplock in Sullivan ‘A malfunctioning of the mind of transitory effect caused by
the application to the body of some external factor such as violence, drugs, including
anaesthetics, alcohol and hypnotic influences cannot fairly be said to be due to
disease and does not constitute a disease of the mind.’
The same is true where a woman suffers a state of dissociation resulting(a
post-traumatic stress disorder) from being rapes or where a diabetic gets into
a hypoglycemic coma as a result of failing to take food after taking insulin
(since the consequent effect of the insulin is due to an external factor). It
would be different if a diabetic failed to take his insulin and got into a
hyperglycemic coma as a result, because it would be the diabetes itself(an
internal factor) which would have caused the coma.
Sane automatism (external)
R v Quick (1973)
the diabetic defendant was a nurse at a psychiatric hospital, who attacked a patient.
He claimed that due to hypoglycaemia, brought on by not eating after taking insulin,
he had acted without knowing what he was doing.
Held: The defendant was suffering from automatism, which is a mental abnormality
caused by an external factor. He was not suffering from insanity caused by
hypoglycaemia (low sugar in the blood) by taking insulin prescribed by his doctor.
(distinguished from hyperglycaemia high blood sugar occurring naturally, which
would be insanity)
Lawton LJ: ‘a self-induced incapacity will not excuse.. nor will one which could have
been reasonably foreseen as a result of either doing or omitting to do something, for
,example, taking alcohol against medical advice after using certain prescribed drugs
or failing to have regular meals while taking insulin – not guilty
Disease of the mind is a legal term not a
Insane automatism medical one
Kemp (1957)
The defendant suffered from arteriosclerosis (hardening of the arteries) which
restricted the flow of where D lacks blood to the brain, causing blackouts. In this
condition he committed the actus reus control of the of grievous bodily harm (GBH)
(he hit his wife with a hammer).
In medical terms, arteriosclerosis is not considered to be a disease that affects the
brain, but the court held that for the defence of insanity, the ‘mind’ meant ‘the
ordinary mental faculties of reason, memory and understanding’, rather than the
brain in the physical sense.
Sullivan (1984)
While D was at the home of a friend, he had an epileptic fit. In the course of that fit
he attacked and injured the friend. D argued that he should be allowed the defence
of automatism. The trial judge ruled that his defence was insanity.
Key law: the disease can be one which causes a transient or intermittent impairment
of reason, memory or understanding. The condition need not be permanent.
Burgess (1991)
D attacked a girl, with whom he had been watching a video, with a bottle and
the video recorder and then put his hands round her neck. He claimed he was
sleepwalking and that this should give him the defence of automatism. It was ruled
that the evidence was of an internal cause and so the correct defence was insanity.
Key Law: Any mental disorder which has manifested itself in violence and which is
prone to recur is a disease of the mind. Thus the correct defence is insanity.
Hennessy (1989)
D was a diabetic who needed insulin to control the condition. He was charged with
taking a car and driving whilst disqualified. His defence was that because he had
failed to take his insulin, this had caused him to suffer hyperglycaemia. The
trial judge ruled that this was an internal factor and therefore the defence of insanity.
Key Law: Where the cause of the involuntary behaviour is an internal cause, then
it is a disease of the mind and the correct defence is insanity.
, Guilty
Windle (1952)
D killed his wife by giving her about 100 tablets of aspirin. There was evidence that
he was suffering from a mental illness. However, because he told the police ‘I
suppose they will hang me for this,’ he was aware that what he had done was wrong.
Key Law: Where D knows that what he is doing is wrong, he cannot bring himself
within the M’Naghten Rules. The defence of insanity is not available to him.
Johnson (2007)
D was convicted of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm after he
forced his way into a neighbour’s flat and stabbed him. Evidence from two
psychiatrists was that D was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia and had
hallucinations. Despite this, the psychiatrists were of the view that D knew the
nature and quality of his acts and knew that they were legally wrong. One
physiatrist thought D did not consider what he had done was morally wrong.
Key Law: The Court of Appeal upheld the judge’s ruling that insanity was not
available as D knew the nature and quality of his acts and that they were legally
wrong.
AG’s Reference (No 2 of 1992)(1993)
D was a lorry driver who, after driving for several hours, drove along the hard
shoulder of a motorway for about half a mile and hit a broken-down car.
Key Law: Reduced or partial awareness is not enough to found a defence of
automatism
Clarke (2009)
D was a diabetic who suffered hypoglycemic episode while driving. He lost control of
his car and hit and killed a pedestrian. He was convicted of causing death by
dangerous driving. The conviction was upheld.
Moses Lj: ‘Automatism due to a hypoglycaemic attack will not be a defence if the
attack might reasonably have been avoided. If the driver ought to have tested his
blood glucose level before embarking on his journey, or appreciated the onset of
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