Manslaughter Notes (Criminal Law, Module 3)

Dajanae Dawkins

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There are two types:

🪓Voluntary

-Murder but with special circumstances reduces it to manslaughter (EG: Involuntary Intoxication, Provocation)

🪓Involuntary/Constructive manslaughter

-Where the actus reus of an unlawful homicide is unaccompanied by malice aforethought

-I didn’t want it to happen but foresaw it/an ordinary man foresaw it

-Homicidal offences (unlawful) are committed without malice aforethought

Elements

1.must be an unlawful act

2.the unlawful act must be a dangerous act so that a reasonable person would have realised that there is a risk of injury (objective test of reasonable foreseeability) (an ordinary man must have foreseen the act, not the defendant)

3.unlawful act must have resulted in death

The categories/circumstances when involuntary manslaughter arise

*Where an unlawful act causes death

*Omission to perform a duty

*Gross negligence

A.Unlawful Act causes death

An unlawful and dangerous act; In R v Church, Justice Davis eloquently and pellucidly stated that the unlawful act must be such that all sober, prudent and reasonable people would inevitably recognise, must subject the other person to, at least, the risk of some harm resulting their from

An act is unlawful if it results in some injury but not necessarily serious

Likelihood of harm

*Basically you do an unlawful act that causes death, even though death wasn’t the intention

The test is not whether the accused recognised the danger, it is whether a sober and reasonable man would recognise.

Cases

R v Larkin (constructive involuntary manslaughter)

-unlawful act: having a weapon/threatened with a knife

-ordinary man test: an ordinary man would think his act dangerous

-the victim died due to his acts

R v Church (constructive involuntary manslaughter)

-unlawful act: knock her out/throw her in river

-ordinary man test: an ordinary man would think it was dangerous

-victim died due to his acts

R v Lamb

R v Mackie

-unlawful act: M threatening his girl/running after the child menacingly

-ordinary man test: the ordinary man would see danger from M’s act of running after the child

-victim died due to his acts

B.Omission to perform a duty

C.Gross negligence (heightened form of negligence)

The offence of gross negligence manslaughter (GNM) is committed where the death is a result of a grossly negligent (though otherwise lawful) act or omission on the part of the defendant - R v Adomako

In order for the prosecution to successfully establish manslaughter by gross negligence, the following must be established:

1.The defendant must owe the victim a duty of care

2.The defendant must have breached that duty of care which he owed to the deceased either by a negligent act or an omission to act

3.The negligent act or the omission to act which constitutes a breach of the duty of care must have caused the death of the deceased. It must be either a direct/substantive/proximate/operating cause

4.The negligence which was a cause of the death of the deceased must amount to gross negligence (must not be simple, but extra) AND constitute a crime

1.Explanation of Duty of Care

-Caparo v Dickman outlined the three things to determine if a duty of care arises:

*Foreseeability of the damage

*Whether the claimant was in an appropriate position of proximity to the defendant (lawyer client, patient doctor, etc)

*Whether it was fair and just to impose liability on accused

2.Breach of Duty

In order to establish a breach of duty, the objective test of reasonableness of the ordinary man must be applied

Bolam case:

A doctor was sued for negligence, the case made it clear anyone who sues a doctor of negligence must prove that other doctors of the same specialty would not have done what the doctor did. Doctors are held at a very high standard thus its harder to prove a doctor negligent and so not any and anyone can sue a doctor of negligence

3.Causation

Basically the negligent act was the direct/proximate cause of the victim’s death

4.Grossness

The breach of duty must be so bad as to be gross, i.e. criminal. as defined in Adomako case

The prosecution must prove the following two elements:

a) that the circumstances were such that a reasonably prudent person in the defendant's position would have foreseen a serious and obvious risk of death arising from the defendant's act or omission (an ordinary reasonable man would foresee the serious and obvious risk of death, the defendants act was SOOOO BADDD)

b) that the breach of duty was, in all the circumstances, so reprehensible and fell so far below the standards to be expected of a person in the defendant's position with his qualifications, experience and responsibilities that it amounted to a crime. (flopped so hard it was practically a crime)

OR YOU CAN USE THESE ELEMENTS

*must foresee serious and obvious risk of death

*conduct must be so bad/so reprehensible

=CRIMINAL LIABILITY

*Remember for Gross Negligence Manslaughter (GNM) since it pertains to negligence it should be obvious that elements of negligence must be included when listing the characteristics (duty of care, breach of duty, causation and direct relationship). Hence, it’s best to stick with the first set of elements listed (1-4)*

Cases

R v Bateman

R v Adomako

Andrews V DPP

R v Mirza

R v Prince & Sulliman

R v  Caparo Industries Ltd v Dickman

Bolam V Frien Hospital Managment Ltd.

R v Barrington Graham

🪓Defences available for manslaughter

*There are two defences that are considered partial to manslaughter (

*life imprisonment (after seven years) you are entitled to parole

*1-2 reduce murder to voluntary manslaughter

*3b is a full defence to involuntary manslaughter

1.Provocation

*the prosecution raises this not always the defendant

-A partial defence that applies to murder ONLY, it reduces murder to voluntary manslaughter (so the start is murder then its reduced to manslaughter)

-Any act/words done/spoken by the deadman to the accused which would cause the accused (any reasonable man) to lose temporary self control to the point where with oblique intent (not master of his mind) is subject to passion (kills him) (R v Duffy)

-Some act or series of acts done by the dead man to the accused which would cause in any reasonable person and actually causes in the accused a sudden and temporary loss of self control rendering the accused so subject to passion as to make him/her for the moment not master of his mind

-eg: if A in Westmorland tells B in Kingston to suck him mada!, if B kills A it isn’t provocation, yes the words are provocative but B can’t lose self control and kill A all the way over Westmorland. Killing must be in the moment, it would take considerable time for b to drive to A thus not in the moment.

-Section 6 of the Offence Against The Persons Act and Section 3 of the Homicide Act both introduced the element (b) as it isn’t in common law

-Both subjective since it refers to the defendant and objective since it includes the reasonable man

Elements

*Loss of self control

*Things done or said by dead man to accused/someone related to the accused

*Reasonable man test

a.Loss of self-control

-Provocation is only in the case of a sudden temporary loss of self-control of such a kind as to make the accused not master of his mind for a moment

-Therefore it is in the moment, not a while after or pre meditated

b.Things done or said (not common law but introduced by the statutes above)

-They may be done or said by the deceased or anyone else

-This must be directly linked to the defendant’s act

-Cannot be something done or said usually

Cases:

R v Davis

R v Doughty

c.Reasonable man

-In DPP v Camplin this case an old man raped a teen boy and turned around and laughed at him. The boy hit him in the head with a pot in retaliation and ended up killing the old man. In the end his conviction of murder was squashed and he was charged with manslaughter as a reasonable man would have done what he did.

*The above was the leading case until R v Smith

Characteristics such as:

*drunkenness

*excitability

*pugnacity (ego)

-Can’t evade you from liability and you will not qualify for provocation (if you have any you can’t use it as an excuse)

Cumulative Provocation

-If there is evidence of previous provocative acts or past conduct, especially in cases of domestic violence, which caused the defendant to lose self control temporarily, this defence is applicable

eg: provocation leading to post traumatise stress syndrome

provocation leading to battered woman syndrome

*The more time that has passed between the last of the continuous abusive acts of the victim and the defendant killing the victim, the less likely you’ll be successful

Cases:

R v Ahluwalia

The lady was in a relationship with this man who constantly abused her. One day she snapped and burned down the house with him in it. She claimed provocation as the series of acts of abuse led to her temporary loss of self control. Held due to the time of the last abuse and A’s killing of the man there was ‘provocation leading to battered woman syndrome’.

R v Gregory and others

The deceased had bullied the accused over a period of time

Self induced Provocation

The mere fact that the accused caused a reaction in others which in turn led him to lose is self-control does not preclude a successful defence of provocation (R v Johnson)

In other words, you can’t for example get drunk to kill a person and use drunkenness as an excuse

Local case:

Alexander Van Stark v R

Old cases:

Manchini v DPP

Holness v DPP

Bedder v DPP

(R v Duffy changed these, and is the starting point for provocation cases)

2.Diminished responsibility/Partial Insanity (Retarded is what separates this from insanity)

*you could argue both insanity and diminished responsibility depending on question, but if you see retarded lean to DR

-A partial defence that applies to murder ONLY, it reduces murder to voluntary manslaughter (so the start is murder then its reduced to manslaughter)

Cases:

R v Bryne (leading case)

R v Golds

Elements (Homicide Act of England)

a.The accused must be suffering from an abnormality of mind

b.Such abnormality of the mind/the abnormality of the mind must arose from a condition of arrested or retarded development of the mind or any inherent causes or was induced by disease or injury

(abnormality is because he has a retarded development, arrested development, a disease or accident caused his retardism)

c.Such abnormality substantially impaired his mental responsibility for his acts in doing or being a party to the killing (him being mad must cause a large effect, not minimal to the point where he killed someone)

What does substantial impairment of the mind mean? (c)

It means any of the following:

-that the accused did not understand the nature and quality of their conduct/acts

-the accused did not or could not form a rational judgement

-the accused could not exercise self control

*the accused brings this up and must provide the medical evidence

3.Intoxication (if involuntary it is a full defence)

There are two types: Voluntary and Involuntary

*These are only for crimes of basic intent (don’t require a high degree of mens rea (assault, etc)

*involuntary is applicable as a defence to specific and basic intent crimes

*voluntary to none

The basic principle is that intoxication isn’t generally a defence, however where there is a crime that involves specific intent (murder, rape, wounding with intent)

Cases:

*DPP v Beard (leading case)

*AG For Northern Ireland v Gallagher (Dutch Courage Intoxication) (leading case)

*R v Lipman

*R v Hardie

*R V Allen

*R V Kingston

*DPP v Majewski

3a.Voluntary

The accused conscientiously or knowingly took the drug (including alcohol and solvents). If this occurs and the accused then commits a crime, they cannot rely on this defence (R v Beard)

IF YOU WILLINGLY TAKE DRUGS WHETHER YOU INTENDED TO OR NOT YOU WOULD BE GUILTY OF THE CRIME BECAUSE YOU PUT YOURSELF IN THAT STATE

Case:

DPP v Majewski: he voluntarily used a number of drugs but he previously had the intention to harm the person. He couldn’t rely on intoxication because he already possessed the intention

3b.Involuntary

The accused did not conscientiously or knowingly took the drug (including alcohol and solvents)