Related Research Articles
The M'Naghten rule is any variant of the 1840s jury instruction in a criminal case when there is a defence of insanity:
that every man is to be presumed to be sane, and ... that to establish a defence on the ground of insanity, it must be clearly proved that, at the time of the committing of the act, the party accused was labouring under such a defect of reason, from disease of the mind, as not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing; or if he did know it, that he did not know he was doing what was wrong.
Actus reus, sometimes called the external element or the objective element of a crime, is the Latin term for the "guilty act" which, when proved beyond a reasonable doubt in combination with the mens rea, "guilty mind", produces criminal liability in the common law−based criminal law jurisdictions of England and Wales, Canada, Australia, India, Kenya, Pakistan, Philippines, South Africa, New Zealand, Scotland, Nigeria, Ghana, Ireland, Israel and the United States of America. In the United States, Some crimes also require proof of attendant circumstances and/or proof of a required result directly caused by the actus reus.
Automatism is a rarely used criminal defence. It is one of the mental condition defences that relate to the mental state of the defendant. Automatism can be seen variously as lack of voluntariness, lack of culpability (unconsciousness) or excuse (Schopp). Automatism means that the defendant was not aware of his or her actions when making the particular movements that constituted the illegal act. For example, Esther Griggs in 1858 threw her child out of a first floor window believing that the house was on fire, while having a sleep terror. In 2002, Peter Buck, lead guitarist of the band R.E.M., was cleared of several charges, including assault, which resulted from automatism brought on by a bad interaction between alcohol and sleeping pills. In a 2009 case in Aberporth in west Wales, Brian Thomas strangled his wife in their camper van, also during a sleep terror, when he mistook his wife for an intruder. The defence of automatism is denying that the person was acting in the sense that the criminal law demands. As such it is really a denial-of-proof – the defendant is asserting that the offence is not made out. The prosecution does not have to disprove the defence as is sometimes erroneously reported; the prosecution has to prove all the elements of the offence including the voluntary act requirement. Automatism is a defence even against strict liability crimes like dangerous driving, where no intent is necessary.
R v Daviault [1994] 3 S.C.R. 63, is a Supreme Court of Canada decision on the availability of the defence of intoxication for "general intent" criminal offences. The Leary rule which eliminated the defence was found unconstitutional in violation of both section 7 and 11(d) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Instead, intoxication can only be used as a defence where it is so extreme that it is akin to automatism or insanity.
R v Parks, [1992] 2 S.C.R. 871 is a leading Supreme Court of Canada decision on the criminal automatism defence.
The case of Hill v Baxter concerns the issue of automatism in driving in England and Wales without a diagnosed condition. It sets out guidelines as to when the defence will apply, and when it will not and what jury instructions should be given to leave the defence open for them to find or deny, given appropriate medical evidence and the extent of wrongfulness involved in allowing the automatism to occur in many circumstances.
R v Quick [1973] QB 910 is an English criminal case, as to sane automatism and the sub-category of self-inducement of such a state. The court ruled that it may not be used as a defence if the defendant's loss of self-control was on the part of neglience in consuming or not consuming something which someone ought to but the jury must be properly directed so as to make all relevant findings of fact. The ruling stresses that automatism is usually easily distinct from insanity, in the few cases where the lines are blurred it is a complex problem for prosecutors and mental health professionals.
R v Bailey is a 1983 decision of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales considering criminal responsibility as to non-insane automatism. The broad questions addressed were whether a hampered state of mind, which the accused may have a legal and moral duty to lessen or avoid, gave him a legal excuse for his actions; and whether as to any incapacity there was strong countering evidence on the facts involved. The court ruled that the jury had been misdirected as to the effect of a defendant's mental state on his criminal liability. However, Bailey's defence had not been supported by sufficient evidence to support an acquittal and his appeal was dismissed.
English criminal law concerns offences, their prevention and the consequences, in England and Wales. Criminal conduct is considered to be a wrong against the whole of a community, rather than just the private individuals affected. The state, in addition to certain international organisations, has responsibility for crime prevention, for bringing the culprits to justice, and for dealing with convicted offenders. The police, the criminal courts and prisons are all publicly funded services, though the main focus of criminal law concerns the role of the courts, how they apply criminal statutes and common law, and why some forms of behaviour are considered criminal. The fundamentals of a crime are a guilty act and a guilty mental state. The traditional view is that moral culpability requires that a defendant should have recognised or intended that they were acting wrongly, although in modern regulation a large number of offences relating to road traffic, environmental damage, financial services and corporations, create strict liability that can be proven simply by the guilty act.
In the field of criminal law, there are a variety of conditions that will tend to negate elements of a crime, known as defenses. The label may be apt in jurisdictions where the accused may be assigned some burden before a tribunal. However, in many jurisdictions, the entire burden to prove a crime is on the prosecution, which also must prove the absence of these defenses, where implicated. In other words, in many jurisdictions the absence of these so-called defenses is treated as an element of the crime. So-called defenses may provide partial or total refuge from punishment.
Insanity in English law is a defence to criminal charges based on the idea that the defendant was unable to understand what he was doing, or, that he was unable to understand that what he was doing was wrong.
R v Burgess [1991] 2 QB 92 was an appeal in the Court of Appeal of England and Wales that adjudged sleepwalking entailing violence from an internal, organic cause amounts to insane automatism. At first instance he was likewise found not guilty by reason of insanity as his case fell under the M'Naghten Rules. This would entail a possible stigma and a treatment plan. His defence team appealed arguing such automatism was no form of 'insanity' but fell within the class of automatism such as a spiked drink which could show a complete lack of mens rea, outwith the realms of normal mental health, to make him guilty. The court ruled that violent sleepwalking with no external triggers was considered insane automatism. Thus the appeal was heard, argued, the law and its consequences judicially considered. The appeal was dismissed.
Unconscious fraud is fraud committed by somebody who does not consciously realise that they are deceiving others. Examples could be a hypnotised person or perhaps a medium in a trance, neither of whom would consciously realise that they are engaging in acts which make others believe - such as that a 'spirit' has moved an object.
South African criminal law is the body of national law relating to crime in South Africa. In the definition of Van der Walt et al., a crime is "conduct which common or statute law prohibits and expressly or impliedly subjects to punishment remissible by the state alone and which the offender cannot avoid by his own act once he has been convicted." Crime involves the infliction of harm against society. The function or object of criminal law is to provide a social mechanism with which to coerce members of society to abstain from conduct that is harmful to the interests of society.
Minister of Safety and Security v Luiters is an important case in the South African law of delict. It was heard in the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) on March 7, 2006, with judgment delivered on March 17. Mpati DP, Farlam JA, Navsa JA, Cloete JA and Van Heerden JA presided. RT Williams SC appeared for the appellant and HM Raubenheimer SC for the respondent. The appellant's attorneys were the State Attorneys, Cape Town and Bloemfontein. The respondent's attorneys were Smith & De Jongh, Bellville; Milton de la Harpe, Cape Town; and Honey Attorneys, Bloemfontein. The case was an appeal from a decision in the Cape Provincial Division by Thring J. A subsequent application to appeal it further to the Constitutional Court was rejected.
Jetha v Rex is an important case in South African criminal law, with its bearing on the defence of impossibility. It was heard in the Natal Provincial Division on April 22, 1929, by Dove-Wilson JP, Tatham J and Matthews J. It was an appeal from the Durban Magistrate's Court. TB Horwood appeared for the appellant and JDM Rosenow for the Crown. The appellant's attorneys were CP Robinson & Goulding.
R v Victor, an appeal against a conviction by a magistrate, is an important case in South African criminal law, especially as it bears on the defence of automatism. The driver of a motor vehicle was prone to epileptic fits, and knew as much, but nevertheless put himself behind the wheel of a motor car. He suffered a fit while driving and collided with a pedestrian and another car. The court on appeal sustained his conviction by a magistrate on the ground that the negligence which the accused there committed was not so much in the driving of the vehicle, but in his driving at all, knowing of his physical disability. A reasonable person would have foreseen the likelihood of a fit and refrained from driving.
In R v Schoonwinkel, an important case in South African criminal law, particularly as it applies to the defence of automatism, the driver of a motor vehicle was charged with culpable homicide, having collided with and killed a passenger in another car. The accused had suffered an epileptic fit at the time of the accident, rendering his mind a blank. The nature of his epilepsy was such that he would normally not have realised or foreseen the dangers of driving, having had only two previous minor attacks, the last a long time before the accident. This evidence, distinguishing this case from R v Victor, exonerated him from criminal responsibility. The court found additionally that this was not a case falling under the provisions of the Mental Disorders Act, read with section 219 of the Criminal Procedure Act.
In S v Chretien, an important case in South African criminal law, especially as it pertains to the defence of automatism, the Appellate Division held that even automatism arising out of voluntary intoxication may constitute an absolute defence, leading to a total acquittal, where, inter alia, the accused drinks so much that they lack criminal capacity.
The Committee on Mentally Abnormal Offenders, widely referred to as the Butler Committee after its chairman Lord Butler of Saffron Walden, was set up in 1972 by the Government of the United Kingdom. The Committee submitted an Interim Report in 1974 and published a Final Report in October 1975, proposing major reforms to the law and to psychiatric services.
References
- R v Mkize 1959 (2) SA 260 (N).
