Notes on murder and partial defences to murder including Actus Reus and mens rea as well as loss of control and diminished responsibility. includes key cases and case facts and presented in a colourful format
Answer: Unlawful killing of another person in the Queen\'s peace
2.
Is murder a result crime or a conduct crime?
Answer: Result crime
3.
Who is defined as being a person under the definition of murder
Answer: Victims of murder must be a human; foetuses are not yet persons in law
4.
What is the mens rea of murder
Answer: An intention to kill or cause grievous bodily harm (GBH)
5.
what does GBH mean?
Answer: Really serious harm
6.
Where is diminished responsibility defined?
Answer: Homocide Act 1957, s.2 (as amended by Coroner\'s and Justice Act 2009)
7.
What is diminished responsibility?
Answer: D is claiming that because of her medical condition she should be partially excused. She should not be held to the standard of the ordinary person
8.
Who is the burden of proof on in diminished responsibility cases
Answer: On a charge of murder, it shall be for the defence to prove that the person charged is by virtue of this section not liable to be convicted of murder - this is found in s2(2) Homocide Act 1957
9.
What are the 4 stages of a diminished responsibility defence
Answer: Abnormality of mental functioning: s. 2(1)
Arising from a recognised medical condition: s. 2(1)(a)
Substantial impairment of D’s ability in one or more of 3 ways: s. 2(1)(b)
Explanation for D’s acts and omissions: s. 2(1B
10.
What is an abnormality of mental functioning? and in which case is this found?
Answer: R v. Byrne [1960] 2 Q.B. 396.
Refers to volitional and cognitive control by the mind
It was said that abnormal meant so different from that of an ordinary person that the reasonable man would term it abnormal.
Introduction
Width of murder/ manslaughter
Law reform: law commission Report, No. 304, Murder, Manslaughter and infanticide,
2006.
Fair labelling
Sentence.
Homicide – murder
Actus reus of murder
Unlawful killing of another person in the Queen’s peace
Result crime
D’s conduct: Killing = causing death.
o Act or omission: R v. Gibbons and Proctor (1918] 13 Cr App R 134 – parents
withheld food from child to whom they had a duty of care.
o Normal rules of causation apply: R v. Adams [1957] Crim LR 365.
Necessary circumstances?
A person
Victims of murder must be a human; foetuses are not yet persons in law
Human life begins at birth
Offences against the person Act 1861, s. 58/ Abortion Act 1967 – protect foetuses
R v. Poulton (1832) 5 C & P 329.
R v. Senior (1832) 1 Mood CC 346.
, Attorney General’s Reference (No.3 of 1994) [1998] AC 245.
o Court refused to convict D of murder as she stabbed X when she was
pregnant only intending to injure her.
o V (X’s baby) dies from the stab injury to X 4 months after being born.
o Would’ve been extending the scope of transferred malice too far.
When does life end?
Re: A (a minor) [1992] 3 Med LR 303
o Law accepts medical definition of death: a person dies once she stops
breathing, the heart stops pumping blood and the brain ceases to function.
R v. Malcherek and Steel [1981] 1 WLR 690
o Death in law is brain death as confirmed in the case of Malcherek and Steel.
o Brain death is an irreversible condition involving the complete non-
functioning of the brain stem which control reflexive functions of the body.
Aierdale NHS Trust v. Bland [1993] AC 789
o Court said someone short of brain death, so in a persistent vegetative state,
like Bland, is still alive & therefore is still a person capable of being
murdered.
Unlawfully and in the Queen’s peace
Public or private defence
o R v. Beckford [1988] AC 130. – self defence.
War and the killing of alien enemies.
Mens rea of murder
An intention to kill or cause grievous bodily harm
(‘GBH)
R v. Vickers [1957] 2 QB 664
R v. Cunnighman [1982] AC 566
o D killed V by htting on head with chair; even though there was no intent to
kill D intended to cause GBH and that was sufficient .
R v. Rahman [2008] UKHL 45.
Meaning of intention? Direct/ oblique intention – within mens rea topic
R v. Moloney [1985] AC 905
R v. Woollin [1999] 1 AC 82.
Remember Intention is subjectively assessed
2
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