Summary
Summary Involuntary Manslaughter
- Module
- Criminal Law
- Institution
- SOAS , University Of London (SOAS)
A summary of involuntary manslaughter.
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Week 11 tutorial: Involuntary ManslaughterInvoluntary manslaughter has nothing to do with involuntariness.
Voluntary manslaughter arises where D commits murder and then relies on a partial defence,
involuntary manslaughter arises where D does not satisfy the mens rea of murder, so does not
commit murder but becomes liable for a manslaughter offence.
It requires the actus reus of murder to have been fulfilled.
The mens rea requirement of involuntary manslaughter offences do not require an intention to kill
or cause GBH which is the mens rea of murder.
Three main involuntary manslaughter offences:
• Unlawful act manslaughter: D commits a criminal act in dangerous circumstances and this
causes the death of V.
• Gross negligence manslaughter: D causes V’s death through criminal negligence.
• Reckless manslaughter: D causes V’s death, being reckless as to causing death or GBH
Unlawful act manslaughter
It is an offence in which, by her acts, D commits a criminal offence ( the base offence), the base
offence carries an objective risk of harm to V, and V dies as a result.
It applies to cases falling just short of liability for murder. Where D kills V foreseeing death or GBH
as a high probability it is likely that UAM will be applied. However, UAM will apply where D
completed a relatively minor offence without foreseeing such fatal risks, where as a matter of ‘bad
luck’ death results.
UAM does not require D to have any mens rea as to the dangerousness of her act, or as to the
resulting death: UAM is a constructive liability offence, with dangerousness and the death
constructing upon the base offence to increase liability to UAM.
The unlawful act (base offence)
We must identify the charge that D would have faced if no one died. That is called the base
offence. The most common base offences within the UAM are offences against the person. Other
criminal offences will also qualify. Two important restrictions on the types of base offences that will
satisfy this element.
A) The base offence must be one requiring subjective mens rea: The House of Lords in Andrews v
DPP states that a base offence for UAM required an intrinsically criminal offence, not satisfied
by a ‘lawful act with a degree of negligence that the legislature makes criminal’. This has been
interpreted to mean that offences satisfied by a mens rea of negligence, or those requiring no
mens rea at all, will not qualify as potential base offences for UAM.
B) The base offence must have been completed by an act rather than an omission: In Lowe, the
Court of Appeal held that D was not guilt of UAM where his base offence was one of omitting to
care for his child.
The base offence must be dangerous to V
It is the requirement that a sober and reasonable person in D’s position would have foreseen that
her acts carried a risk of harm to V at the time D acted. This is an objective requirement: there is
no need to show that D herself foresaw any such risks unless that is a requirement of the mens rea
of the base offence. The base offence does not need to be directed or targeted at V.
Dangerousness should be applied with reference to V: the element should not be satisfied if
danger to another is foreseeable , but not danger to V.
The full test of dangerousness is usefully set out by Edmund Davies J in Church:
the unlawful act must be such that all sober and reasonable people would inevitably recognise that
it must subject the other person to, at least, the risk of some harm resulting, therefrom, albeit not
serious harm.
A. What type of foresight?
R v Dawson. D has clearly completed the base offence and caused death. However, as harm to V
was not objectively foreseeable, this element was not satisfied and there could be no liability for
UAM.
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