The defendant had used his car to chase some people who had assaulted him and had so manoeuvred his car as to prevent their escape. The statutory defence in the 1967 Act (‘a person may use such force as is reasonable in the circumstances . . in effecting or assisting in the lawful arrest of offenders or suspected offenders’) was available against a charge of reckless driving. ‘This case has to be considered in the light of the evidence which was said to have amounted to reckless driving. This evidence had two facets: one was what the prosecution alleged to be the acts of recklessness; and the other was that these same acts amounted to the use of reasonable force for the purpose of assisting in the lawful arrest of offenders. In our judgment it is only when the evidence has these two facets that s 3(1) of the 1967 Act can apply. This being so, the occasions for relying on that section will be rare, certainly not when the reckless acts were antecedent to the use of force. In our judgment the alleged presence of these two facets in the appellant’s evidence concerning why he did the acts which the prosecution said were reckless was capable of providing him with a defence. It is no answer for the prosecution to submit, as counsel for the Crown did, that the wording of ss 1 and 2 of the Road Traffic Act 1972 shuts out any possibility of such a defence because they contained no words such as ‘lawful excuse’. Nor does s 20 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861; but s 3(1) has been used to provide a defence to charges under that section.’
Judges:
Lawton LJ
Citations:
[1986] 2 All ER 449, [1986] 1 WLR 522
Statutes:
Cited by:
Cited – Director of Public Prosecutions v Bayer, Hart, Snook, and Whistance Admn 4-Nov-2003
The defendants protested the growing of genetically modified crops. The prosecutor appealed dismissal of charges of aggravated trespass for them having entered a crop and attached themselves to tractors. The district judge decided they had genuine . .
Cited – Regina v Jones (Margaret), Regina v Milling and others HL 29-Mar-2006
Domestic Offence requires Domestic Defence
Each defendant sought to raise by way of defence of their otherwise criminal actions, the fact that they were attempting to prevent the commission by the government of the crime of waging an aggressive war in Iraq, and that their acts were . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Crime, Road Traffic
Updated: 29 April 2022; Ref: scu.187493