The accused had purchased cyanide and put it into the deceased’s glass but in a lesser concentration than was necessary to kill a person who consumed it. The medical evidence was that the death was not due to poisoning and no trace of cyanide was found in the body.
Held: The accused was found to have been rightly convicted of an attempt to murder her. The issue is one of proximity or remoteness. One who intends to kill another by slow poisoning is guilty of attempted murder as soon as he administers or attempts to administer the first dose which by itself may not be fatal.
Bray J said: ‘All that can be definitely gathered from the authorities is that to constitute a criminal attempt, the first step along the way of criminal intent is not necessarily sufficient and the final step is not necessarily required. The dividing line between preparation and attempt is to be found somewhere between these two extremes; but as to the method by which it is to be determined the authorities give no clear guidance . . the completion or attempted completion of one of a series of acts intended by a man to result in killing is an attempt to murder even although this completed act would not, unless followed by the other acts result in killing. It might be the beginning of the attempt, but would none the less be an attempt. It could not be the case that any act of an accused, however remote, which is connected to a subsequent attempt to kill another is sufficient to constitute an attempt to murder. The purchase of a weapon or the purchase of poison would not alone constitute the offence because of the lack of proximity between that act and any act by which the life of another was threatened . . As to the difference between acts which are attempts to murder and acts which are done with intent to murder, we feel some difficulty in accepting what Kennedy J. says in Rex v. Linneker (1); but, however that may be, it is sufficient to say, as we have already said, that all the offences in ss. 11-15 are treated as attempts to murder, and there cannot be an act done with intent to murder without its being an attempt to murder, and a prisoner cannot be convicted under s. 9 of 14 and 15 Vict. c. 100 unless, as here, the jury have found him guilty of an attempt to murder.’

Bray J
[1910] 2 KB 124, (1910) 4 Cr App R 257
England and Wales

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 02 November 2021; Ref: scu.544331

The defendant had been convicted of manslaughter. He had supplied a class A drug to a friend who then died taking it. The House was asked ‘When is it appropriate to find someone guilty of manslaughter where that person has been involved in the supply of a class A controlled drug, which is then freely and voluntarily self-administered by the person to whom it was supplied, and the administration of the drug then causes his death?’
Held: The appeal was allowed and the appellant’s conviction for manslaughter quashed. ‘The appellant supplied the drug to the deceased, who then had a choice, knowing the facts, whether to inject himself or not. The heroin was, as the certified question correctly recognises, self-administered, not jointly administered. The appellant did not administer the drug. Nor, for reasons already given, did the appellant cause the drug to be administered to or taken by the deceased. The answer to the certified question was: ‘In the case of a fully-informed and responsible adult, never’.

Lord Bingham of Cornhill, Lord Rodger of Earlsferry, Baroness Hale of Richmond, Lord Carswell and Lord Mance
[2007] UKHL 38, Times 19-Oct-2007, [2007] 4 All ER 1083, [2007] 3 WLR 612, [2007] Inquest LR 234, [2008] 1 Cr App Rep 19, [2008] Crim LR 222, [2008] AC 269
Bailii
Offences against the Person Act 1861 23
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Regina v Franklin 1883
For unlawful act manslaughter, the unlawful act must itself be criminal. . .
Cited – Kennedy v Regina CACD 17-Mar-2005
The court considered when it was appropriate to find someone guilty of manslaughter where that person has been involved in the supply of a Class A controlled drug, which is then self administered by the person to whom it is supplied, and the . .
Cited – Regina v Cato and others CACD 15-Oct-1975
The defendant had injected the deceased with heroin. He appealed his conviction for manslaughter.
Held: Proof of manslaughter requires proof that the unlawful act substantially contributed to the death of the victim. . .
Cited – Regina v Dalby CACD 1982
Dalby and O’Such were drug addicts. Dalby had obtained 32 tablets of Diconal lawfully. Dalby supplied O’Such with some tablets and probably certain further tablets during the evening. Each injected himself intravenously and they then went out . .
Cited – Regina v Dias CACD 13-Dec-2001
The defendant appealed against his conviction for manslaughter. Both the deceased and the defendant had injected themselves with syringes prepared by D. The judge directed the jury that the self-injection of the heroin by the deceased was an . .
Cited – Regina v Latif; Regina v Shahzad HL 23-Jan-1996
The defendant had been lured into the UK by the unlawful acts of customs officers. He claimed abuse of process.
Held: The category of cases in which the abuse of process principles can be applied is not closed. A customs officer committing an . .
Cited – Regina v Gillard 1988
The defendant was guilty of an offence of administering a poison where he sprayed it directly in the victim’s face. . .
Cited – Empress Car Company (Abertillery) Ltd v National Rivers Authority HL 22-Jan-1998
A diesel tank was in a yard which drained into a river. It was surrounded by a bund to contain spillage, but that protection was over ridden by an extension pipe from the tank to a drum outside the bund. Someone opened a tap on that pipe so that . .
Cited – Regina v Finlay CACD 8-Dec-2003
The defendant appealed his conviction for manslaughter. He had been found to have prepared heroin by loading it into a syringe and passing it to a friend.
Held: Even if ‘the appellant had not himself wielded the syringe, he would have . .
Cited – Regina v Rogers CACD 14-Mar-2003
The defendant appealed a conviction for manslaughter and assault under the 1861 Act. He held a belt around a friend’s arm whilst the friend injected heroin into his own vein. The friend later died from the overdose. He said the use of the tourniquet . .

Cited by:
Cited – Corr v IBC Vehicles Ltd HL 27-Feb-2008
The claimant’s husband had committed suicide. She sought damages for financial loss from his former employers under the 1976 Act. He had suffered a severe and debilitating injury working for them leading to his depression and suicide. The employers . .
Cited – Kane v HM Advocate; MacAngus v HM Advocate HCJ 27-Jan-2009
The defendants appealed against convictions for culpable homicide. In each case they had supplied a drug to the victim who had then self-administered the drug and died as a consequence.
Held: The appeals failed. The court considered whether . .
Cited – Gnango, Regina v SC 14-Dec-2011
The prosecutor appealed against a successful appeal by the defendant against his conviction for murder. He and an opponent had engaged in a street battle using guns. His opponent had shot an innocent passer by. The court was now asked as to whether . .
Cited – Hughes, Regina v SC 31-Jul-2013
Uninsured Driver Not Guilty of Causing Death
The appellant though an uninsured driver, was driving without fault when another vehicle veered across the road. The other driver died from his injuries, and the appellant convicted of causing his death whilst uninsured. At trial he succeeded in . .
Cited – Nicklinson and Another, Regina (on The Application of) SC 25-Jun-2014
Criminality of Assisting Suicide not Infringing
The court was asked: ‘whether the present state of the law of England and Wales relating to assisting suicide infringes the European Convention on Human Rights, and whether the code published by the Director of Public Prosecutions relating to . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 02 November 2021; Ref: scu.259909

The defendants appealed against their convictions for murder. None had themselves inflicted any violence, but were convicted as part of a joint enterprise. They said they had not known that the principal carried a knife. They said that the evidence showed that the knife wound had been intended to kill, but that it was only shown that they had anticipated a serious injury falling short of that murder. The judge had not directed the jury that the defendants had to be shown to have been party to the intention inferred.
Held: The appeals failed.
The law must necessarily include mechanisms for convicting those who take part in a criminal activity without themselves carrying out the central acts, and ‘Given the fluid, fast-moving course of events in incidents such as that which culminated in the killing of the deceased, incidents which are unhappily not rare, it must often be very hard for jurors to make a reliable assessment of what a particular defendant foresaw as likely or possible acts on the part of his associates. It would be even harder, and would border on speculation, to judge what a particular defendant foresaw as the intention with which his associates might perform such acts. It is safer to focus on the defendant’s foresight of what an associate might do, an issue to which knowledge of the associate’s possession of an obviously lethal weapon such as a gun or a knife would usually be very relevant. ‘
and ‘In the prosecution of a principal offender for murder, it is not necessary for the prosecution to prove or the jury to consider whether the defendant intended on the one hand to kill or on the other to cause really serious injury. That is legally irrelevant to guilt. The rationale of that principle plainly is that if a person unlawfully assaults another with intent to cause him really serious injury, and death results, he should be held criminally responsible for that fatality, even though he did not intend it. If he had not embarked on a course of deliberate violence, the fatality would not have occurred. This rationale may lack logical purity, but it is underpinned by a quality of earthy realism. To rule that an undisclosed and unforeseen intention to kill on the part of the primary offender may take a killing outside the scope of a common purpose to cause really serious injury, calling for a distinction irrelevant in the case of the primary offender, is in my view to subvert the rationale which underlies our law of murder. ‘
Lord Brown said: ‘If the principal (the killer) was at all times intent on killing the victim and the secondary party was not, then it is simply unrealistic to talk in terms of their sharing a common purpose. But that matters nothing. Once the wider principle was recognised (or established), as it was in Chan Wing-Siu and Hyde, namely that criminal liability is imposed on anyone assisting or encouraging the principal in his wrongdoing who realises that the principal may commit a more serious crime than the secondary party himself ever intended or wanted or agreed to, then the whole concept of common purpose became superfluous. ‘ and
‘The qualification to the Hyde direction established by English concerns simply the secondary party’s foresight of possible acts by the principal constituting more serious offences than the secondary party himself was intending, acts to which he never agreed and which from his standpoint were entirely unwanted and unintended. But an act is an act and either its possibility is foreseen or it is not. I see no possible reason or justification for further complicating this already problematic area of the law by requiring juries to consider and decide whether the principal’s intent when killing the victim was the full intent to kill or the usual lesser intent to cause GBH. Whichever it was, the act was the act of killing and the only question arising pursuant to the English qualification is whether the possibility of killing in that way (rather than in some fundamentally different way) was foreseen by the accessory-whether the act which caused the death was, as Sir Robin Cooke had put it in Chan Wing Siu, ‘of a type’ foreseen by the secondary party.’

Lord Bingham of Cornhill, Lord Scott of Foscote, Lord Rodger of Earlsferry, Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood, Lord Neuberger of Abbotsbury
[2008] UKHL 45, [2008] 3 WLR 264, Times 07-Jul-2008, [2009] 1 Cr App Rep 1, [2008] Crim LR 979, [2009] AC 129, [2008] 4 All ER 351
Bailii, HL
England and Wales
Citing:
Appeal from – Regina v Rahman; Regina v Akram; Regina v Amin; Regina v Ali CACD 23-Feb-2007
The defendants appealed their convictions for murder. There had been a joint violent attack, but each said they did not know that the principle assailant carried and would use a knife, and said the judge’s directions on joint enterprise were . .
Cited – Regina v Cunningham HL 8-Jul-1981
A defendant may be convicted of murder if it is established either (1) that he had an intent to kill or (2) that he had an intent to cause really serious bodily injury.
Intention is a state of mind which can never be proved as a fact. It can . .
Cited – Brown and Isaac v The State PC 29-Jan-2003
PC (Trinidad and Tobago) The defendants appealed their convictions for murder on a joint enterprise basis.
Held: If more than one person participates, in whatever capacity, in attacking a victim, each . .
Cited – Regina v Powell (Anthony) and Another; Regina v English HL 30-Oct-1997
When the court looked at the issue of foreseeability of murder in an allegation of joint enterprise, there was no requirement to show intent by the secondary party. The forseeability of the risk of the principal committing the offence from the point . .
Cited – Regina v Smith (Wesley) 1963
A group of men set upon a man in a bar and he was stabbed to death.The court considered the law of joint offences. The trial judge had directed the jury: ‘Manslaughter is unlawful killing without an intent to kill or do grievous bodily harm. Anybody . .
Cited – Chan Wing-Siu v The Queen PC 21-Jun-1984
The appellant and co-accused were charged with murder. They said they had gone to meet the deceased to collect a debt, but had been attacked with a knife by the deceased. Two of the three had knives and knew of the other knife.
Held: All were . .
Cited – Regina v Anderson; Regina v Morris CACD 1966
The court considered criminal liability under the joint enterprise rule where the principle took the action beyond what had been anticipated. Parker CJ said: ‘It seems to this court that to say that adventurers are guilty of manslaughter when one of . .
Cited – Regina v Gamble 1989
Four members of the Ulster Volunteer Force had combined to inflict punishment on an allegedly delinquent member of the organisation. The punishment was to consist of knee-capping (the firing of a bullet or bullets into a knee or other joint, so as . .
Cited – McAuliffe v The Queen 28-Jun-1995
Austlii (High Court of Australia) Criminal Law – Murder – Complicity – Common purpose to assault victim – Death – Direction that jury might convict if satisfied accused contemplated that intentional infliction of . .
Cited – Regina v Uddin CACD 19-Mar-1998
A co-accused in a murder by a gang, where the existence of the murder weapon which was used, was outside the expectation of the defendant, need not himself be guilty, because of the different circumstances which applied in his case. . .
Cited – Davies v Director of Public Prosecutions HL 1954
Half a dozen youths engaged in a fist fight with another group, but one of their number suddenly produced a knife and stabbed one of their opponents to death. One of the prosecution witnesses was a youth named Lawson. He gave evidence of an oral . .
Cited – Regina v Hyde, Sussex, Collins CACD 1990
Lord Lane CJ restated the principle underlying the responsibility of a secondary partner in a joint enterprise: ‘If B realises (without agreeing to such conduct being used) that A may kill or intentionally inflict serious injury, but nevertheless . .

Cited by:
Cited – Mitchell and Another, Regina v CACD 4-Nov-2008
The appellant challenged their convictions as ancillary parties to a murder, particularly as to the joint enterprise direction. There had been a scuffle outside a pub. The appellant went away with others to a nearby house, and returned with them . .
Cited – Gnango, Regina v CACD 26-Jul-2010
The defendant appealed against his conviction for murder. He had engaged in a street battle using guns. A bullet from an opponent killed an innocent passer by. The court was asked whether the principles of joint venture and transferred malice could . .
Cited – Jogee and Ruddock (Jamaica) v The Queen SC 18-Feb-2016
Joint Enterprise Murder
The two defendants appealed against their convictions (one in Jamaica) for murder, under the law of joint enterprise. Each had been an accessory when their accomplice killed a victim with a knife. The judge in Jogee had directed the jury that he . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Updated: 02 November 2021; Ref: scu.270657

Reasons for allowance of appeal – use of hearsay evidence

Lord Justice Stanley Burnton
[2011] EWCA Crim 2341, (2011) 175 JP 462
Bailii
England and Wales

Crime

Updated: 02 November 2021; Ref: scu.447504

Minor Error in Juror Directions – Conviction safe

The defendant appealed his conviction of murder. He was said to have instructed two others to carry it out. He now said that evidence had wrongly been admitted of bad character.
Held: It would have been better to direct the jury as to applying the ‘so you are sure’ to the questioned evidence but overall the direction corrected that omission and the error was insufficient to vitiate the conviction.

Davis LJ, Jeremy Baker, Holgate JJ
[2020] EWCA Crim 1473, [2020] WLR(D) 608
Bailii, WLRD
Criminal Justice Act 2003 101
England and Wales

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.655681

An affray may be carried out on private premises as well as in public places.
Lord Gardiner LC spoke of the revival of the ancient offence of affray, saying: ‘It was further argued that no practical purpose is served by re-establishing the law relating to affray, since it could only lead to the multiplication and overlapping of charges. Where a charge of affray could lie, it is said, so too would a charge of assault, and thus the latter charge suffices to protect the public. The respondent, however, contended that evidence is difficult to obtain in the melee of disturbance and fighting and that there are situations in which it would be possible to convict of affray on evidence that would not justify a conviction of assault. The Court of Criminal Appeal took the view that the offence of affray was a useful part of the criminal law in modern times. I agree with that view.’
As to the rule of stare decis: ‘In Corpus Juris Secundum, a contemporary statement of American Law the stare decisis rule has been stated to be a principle of law which has become settled by a series of decisions generally is binding on the courts and should be followed in similar cases. It has been stated that this rule is based on expediency and public policy and should be strictly adhered to by the courts. Under this rule courts are bound to follow the common law as it has been judicially declared in previously adjudicated cases and rules of substantive law should be reasonably interpreted and administered. This rule has to preserve the harmony and stability of the law and to make as steadfast as possible judicially declared principles affecting the rights of property, it being indispensable to the due administration of justice, especially by a court of last resort, that a question once deliberately examined and decided should be considered as settled and closed to further argument. It is a salutary rule, entitled to great weight and ordinarily should be strictly adhered to by the courts. The courts are slow to interfere with the principle announced by the decision, and it may be upheld even though they would decide otherwise were the question a new one, or equitable considerations might suggest a different result and although it has been erroneously applied in a particular case. The rule represents an element of continuity in law and is rooted in the psychologic need to satisfy reasonable expectations, but it is a principle of policy and not a mechanical formula of adherence to the latest decision however recent and questionable when such adherence involves collision with a prior doctrine more embracing in its scope, intrinsically sounder and verified by experience.

Lord Gardiner LC
[1966] AC 591
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Gnango, Regina v SC 14-Dec-2011
The prosecutor appealed against a successful appeal by the defendant against his conviction for murder. He and an opponent had engaged in a street battle using guns. His opponent had shot an innocent passer by. The court was now asked as to whether . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.467710

The defendant agreed to help a friend named Harrington to hide some money for a period. Under the arrangement Harrington transferred around andpound;123,000 into the defendant’s bank account. The defendant used some of it to make some purchases for Harrington and, after an interval, he repaid the balance to Harrington less about andpound;5,000. The prosecution’s case was that the money represented proceeds of a fraud carried out by a bank official, who stole it from dormant accounts. The stolen money was laundered through a network of recipients, each of whom retained a small sum as payment for his services. The recipients included Harrington and the defendant. The defendant’s case was that he was approached by Harrington with a story that he was about to become involved in divorce proceedings, and that the defendant was asked to help Harrington to hide the money from Mrs Harrington (and the court), which he agreed to do. He denied any knowledge that the money had a criminal source.
Held:
Moore-Bick LJ said: ‘In our view the natural and ordinary meaning of section 328(1) is that the arrangement to which it refers must be one which relates to property which is criminal property at the time when the arrangement begins to operate on it. To say that it extends to property which was originally legitimate but became criminal only as a result of carrying out the arrangement is to stretch the language of the section beyond its proper limits. An arrangement relating to property which has an independent criminal object may, when carried out, render the subject matter criminal property, but it cannot properly be said that the arrangement applied to property that was already criminal property at the time it began to operate on it. Moreover, we do not accept that an arrangement of the kind under consideration in the present case can be separated into its component parts, each of which is then to be viewed as a separate arrangement. In this case there was but one arrangement, namely, that the appellant would receive money, hold it for a period and return it. To treat the holding and return as separate arrangements relating to property that had previously been received is artificial.’
Moore-Bick LJ added, obiter, that, on the assumption that the purpose for which the money was transferred to the defendant involved perverting the course of justice, it became criminal property in his hands on its receipt, and he could therefore have been charged with an offence of converting or transferring criminal property contrary to section 327 by returning most of it to Harrington, together with the goods which he had purchased with part of it.

Moore-Bick LJ, Rafferty DBE J, Gilbert QC HHJ
[2010] EWCA Crim 1925, [2011] 1 Cr App R 8, [2011] 1 WLR 1634, [2011] 1 Cr App Rep 8, [2010] Lloyd’s Rep FC 599
Bailii
Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 328(1)
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – GH, Regina v SC 22-Apr-2015
Appeal against conviction for entering into an arrangement for the retention of criminal funds. The defendant said that at the time of the arrangement there were not yet any criminal funds in existence. A had set up websites intending to con . .
Cited – G and Another, Regina v CACD 5-Dec-2013
The defendant had pled not guilty to a charge of entering into a facility which would facilitate money laundering. The court upheld that plea. The prosecutor now appealed.
Held: The appeal failed, although under section 328 it is not necessary . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.421215

The appellants had entered Fortnum and Masons to demonstrate against tax avoidance. They appealed against convitions for aggravated trespass.
Held: The statutory question posed by s.68 is whether the prosecution can prove that the trespasser has done anything on the land (‘there’), apart from trespassing, with the required statutory intent? As to that, there is no warrant for the proposition that continuing occupation on land on which a person has trespassed cannot be a further act distinct from the initial trespass. The allegation here was not only that the accused had trespassed but, once they had entered the premises, that they had demonstrated there.
The remaining allegation was as to intimidation which ‘is a forceful word indicating, in its Latin root, the notion of putting someone in fear.’ The judge was not unreasonable in inferring from the facts of the demonstration that those who took part in it intended to intimidate.
The judge was wrong to treat some as principal offenders and others as accessories. This runs the risk of inhibiting legitimate participation in demonstrations and protests and: ‘it seems to me that in the type of aggravated trespass of which Peppersharp and the instant appeals are examples, there is a contradiction between the facts as found and the conclusion that participants were guilty only as accessories because they encouraged others to commit the offence. That conclusion carries with it the assumption that they themselves had not committed the conduct element of the offence. But if their presence as part of the demonstration did not amount to the conduct element of the offence, because it was not an act distinct from the act of trespass, presence would not have been a sound basis for inferring an intention to intimidate or an intention to encourage. Far better to ask whether they were part of the demonstration and whether that demonstration was itself an act distinct from the trespass, and whether it could be inferred that those participating in the demonstration had one of the three intentions identified in s.68.’
Moses LJ discussed Dehal and said: ‘Whatever the merits of that judgment, it does not seem to me that it should be construed as requiring the prosecution to prove more than conduct which falls within s.68(1). If the prosecution proves that the conduct of a defendant falls within s.68 and that the defendant had the necessary intention, it has nothing additional to prove. It does not have to prove, in addition to the guilt of the defendant, that the prosecution was proportionate. Dehal should be read as no more than an application of Sedley LJ’s warning in Redmond-Bate v DPP [DC.23.7.99] that ‘freedom only to speak inoffensively is not worth having’. The warning has no relevance to the instant appeals. Although I must take the blame, Dehal equally was not an authority that the District Judge needed to consider. Once he found that the case against these appellants was proved under s.68(1) that was an end of the matter.’

Moses LJ, Kenneth Parker J
[2013] EWHC 634 (Admin), [2013] 1 WLR 3617
Bailii
Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 6891)(3)
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Crown Prosecution Service v Barnard and Others QBD 3-Nov-1999
The information against the derendants alleged no more than that the accused had ‘unlawfully occupied the site and that they had done so with the intention specified in s.68’ of the 1994 Act.
Held: The information did not disclose any offence . .
Cited – Peppersharp v Director of Public Prosecutions Admn 10-Feb-2012
The defendant appealed by case stated against his conviction for aggravated trespass. Hostile protesters had entered into Millbank Tower, and ignited smoke bombs and smashed a large plate glass window from the outside.
Held: Irwin J said: ‘On . .
Cited – Brutus v Cozens HL 19-Jul-1972
The House was asked whether the conduct of the defendant at a tennis match at Wimbledon amounted to using ‘insulting words or behaviour’ whereby a breach of the peace was likely to be occasioned contrary to section 5. He went onto court 2, blew a . .
Cited – Customs and Excise Commissioners v Top Ten Promotions Limited 1969
Lord Upjohn, discussing the construction of a statute, said: ‘It is highly dangerous, if not impossible, to attempt to place an accurate definition upon a word in common use; you can look up examples of its many uses if you want to in the Oxford . .
Cited – Regina v Coney QBD 18-Mar-1882
A public prize-fight was unlawful. Spectators were tried at Berkshire County Quarter Sessions with common assault. The Chairman of Quarter Sessions directed the jury to convict the spectators of common assault on the basis that having stayed to . .
Cited – Nero and Another v Director of Public Prosecutions Admn 29-Mar-2012
Parties appealed against convictions for aggravated trespass under the 1994 Act arising from trespassing demonstrations. They argued that the lawfulness of the activity being carried out on the land subject to the trespass is an ingredient in the . .
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 . .
Cited – Dehal v Crown Prosecution Service Admn 27-Sep-2005
The appellant had been convicted under section 4 of the 1986 Act. He had been accused of attending at Luton Guruwarda and intending to cause distress. He said that he had gone only peacefully to express his true religious beliefs. He had left a . .

Cited by:
Cited – James v Director of Public Prosecutions Admn 13-Nov-2015
The appellant challenged her conviction for failing to comply with conditions imposed on a public demonstration. Her demonstration outside the Royal Courts of Justice had brought traffic to a standstill. At trial she had been refused permission to . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.471960

In relation to a charge of theft where the issue of dishonesty is raised, the issue must be left to the jury. Dishonesty is not a matter of law, but a jury question of fact and standards. Except to the limited extent that section 2 of the Theft Act 1968 requires otherwise, judges do not, and must not, attempt to define it. The question was, was what was done dishonest according to the ordinary standards of reasonable and honest people? Lawton LJ said: ‘Jurors, when deciding whether an appropriation was dishonest, can be reasonably expected to, and should, apply the current standards of ordinary decent people.’

Lawton LJ
(1973) 57 Cr App R 512, [1973] QB 530
Theft Act 1968 1
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Regina v Ghosh CACD 5-Apr-1982
The defendant surgeon was said to have made false claims for payment for operations, and was charged under the 1968 Act. He claimed to have been entitled to the sums claimed, and denied that he had been dishonest. The court considered the meaning of . .
Considered – Regina v McIvor CA 1982
The defendant had been refused a loan by his employers. He took the money anyway from the till and repaid it. On discovery he was charged with theft. He denied that he had been dishonest. He had always intended to repay it and had done so. He . .
Explained – Regina v Landy; Regina v White etc CACD 1982
The defendants appealed against convictions for conspiracy to defraud. The three were bank employees including the chairman, and between them managed to take money from the bank by different forms of malpractice. The defendants denied dishonesty, . .
Cited – Regina v O’Connell CACD 1992
The appellant and his wife appliied for loans to buy residential properties to be let to obtain a rental income covering most of the mortgage payments. The properties were later sold to take advantages of increases in value. A sum of andpound;1.5 . .
Cited – Regina v Clarke CACD 2-Apr-1996
Several people had lost large sums of mony by a fraud. The defendant had approached them offering his services as a private investigator to seek to recover their money. He pleaded guilty to one allegation of deception after an indication from the . .
Cited – Ivey v Genting Casinos (UK) Ltd (T/A Crockfords) SC 25-Oct-2017
The claimant gambler sought payment of his winnings. The casino said that he had operated a system called edge-sorting to achieve the winnings, and that this was a form of cheating so as to excuse their payment. The system exploited tiny variances . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.214618

It was alleged that the defendant had tampered with a sample of wheat to be used in an arbitration, and he was accused of perverting the course of justice.
Held: Perverting the course of justice is a common law offence covering a wide variety of situations. The offence was committed when a person does an act or embarks on a course of conduct which tends and is intended to pervert the course of justice. The offence can be committed in otherwise wholly civil proceedings, and there is no closed list of acts which may give rise to the offence and it would be wrong to confine it to the specific instances or categories which have so far appeared in the reported cases. An act is not beyond the ambit of those tending to pervert the course of justice by reason of its being performed after the crime but before investigations into the alleged crime have begun. Whether an act has a tendency to pervert the course of justice cannot depend upon whether investigation of the matter which may become the subject of court proceedings has begun.
cs Lord Coleridge CJ: ‘The first count of the indictment in substance charges the defendant with the misdemeanour of attempting, by the manufacture of false evidence, to mislead a judicial tribunal which might come into existence. If the act itself of the defendant was completed, I cannot doubt that to manufacture false evidence for the purpose of misleading a judicial tribunal is a misdemeanour. Here, in point of fact, no tribunal was misled, because the piece of evidence was not used; but I am of opinion that that fact makes no difference.’ and ‘I think that an attempt to pervert the course of justice is in itself a punishable misdemeanour; and though I should myself have thought so on the grounds of sense and reason, there is also plenty of authority to show that it is a misdemeanour in point of law.’
Pollock B: ‘The real offence here is the doing of some act which has a tendency and is intended to pervert the administration of public justice.’

Pollock B, Lord Coleridge CJ
(1891) 1 QB 360, 60 LJMC 62
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Regina v Clark CACD 4-Apr-2003
The defendant had been involved in a car crash. He drove his car home, and reported the accident only the following day. He appealed against a conviction for attempting to pervert the course of justice, having defeated any possibility of his being . .
Cited – Re S 36 Criminal Justice Act 1972; Attorney General’s Reference No 1 of 2002 CACD 14-Oct-2002
The court was asked: ‘Whether the common-law offence of perverting the course of public justice is committed where false evidence is given or made, not to defeat what the witness believes to be the ends of justice, or not to procure what the witness . .
Cited – Kenny v Regina CACD 30-Jan-2013
The appellant had made a loan to a third party defendant in criminal fraud proceedings. At the time he did not know that that third party was subject to a restraint order under the 2002 Act. When he did come to know of the order he was asked to say . .
Cited – The Director of Public Prosecutions v SK Admn 10-Feb-2016
The prosecutor appealed against dismissal of a charge of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. The defendant had completed somebody else’s community service sentence. The prosecutor said that such an act did affect something ‘in the course of . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.181076

The defendant appealed against his conviction for murder, saying that provocation should have been found. The issue was whether or not, in the course of his summing-up, the trial judge should have left, and if so whether he had left, to the jury the appellant’s ‘unduly possessive and jealous nature’ as a relevant characteristic for their consideration in relation to the objective element of the appellant’s defence of provocation.
Held: ‘there are two elements to the ‘defence’ of provocation. For present purposes they may be identified as follows: (a) whether the defendant lost his self-control; (b) whether he should reasonably have controlled himself. They are sometimes called the ‘subjective element’ and the ‘objective element’. The first element sets up the defence. The second sets a limit.’ On the basis of its analysis of the judgments in Smith (Morgan), the characteristics identified should have been left to the jury.

Lord Justice Mantell, Mr Justice Jack, Mr Justice Hedley
[2003] EWCA Crim 815, [2003] Crim LR 724
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Regina v Jenkins and Another CACD 14-Feb-2002
The decision in Smith (Morgan) does not prevent use of the expression ‘the reasonable man’ in the judge’s summing-up, in Weller, when considering how a jury should be directed on provocation, the court plainly regarded the relevant question as being . .
Cited – Regina v Smith (Morgan James) HL 27-Jul-2000
The defendant had sought to rely upon the defence of provocation. He had suffered serious clinical depression.
Held: When directing a jury on the law of provocation, it was no longer appropriate to direct the jury to disregard any particular . .
Cited – Regina v Stingel 1990
(High Court of Australia) An infatuated man had stabbed his former girlfriend’s lover.
Held: The judge had been right to withdraw the issue of provocation from the jury. Jealousy and possessiveness should not found a defence of provocation. . .
Cited – Regina v Humphreys CACD 1995
Defence of provocation to murder. Abnormal immaturity and attention seeking by wrist slashing were mental characteristics which should have been left for the jury to decide upon. . .
Cited – Regina v Dryden 1995
The court considered the defence of provocation to a charge of murder.
Held: ‘eccentric and obsessional personality traits’ were mental characteristics which should have been left for the jury. . .
Cited – Regina (Director of Public Prosecutions) v Camplin HL 1978
The court considered the direction to be given as to the existence of provocation so as to reduce a charge of murder to one of manslaughter. The reasonable man in the definition should be one with the defendant’s mental condition. ‘The judge should . .
Practice recommendation – Regina v Lowe 21-Feb-2003
The jury had come back into court with a question showing that they were having difficulty in understanding the direction on provocation. A court preparing to direct the jury on the defence of provocation woiuld be wise to submit the form of . .

Cited by:
Cited – Regina v Rowland CACD 12-Dec-2003
The appellant had been convicted of murder. He sought to have substituted a conviction for manslaughter following Smith, and in the light of evidence as to his mental characteristics.
Held: ‘in the context of the law of provocation, the . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.180075

The defendant appealed against his conviction for the murder of his child. He had thrown the child to the floor, hitting the head. He said that he had not intended to kill the child.
Held: On a murder charge, where the short direction on intent was insufficient, the judge should direct on basis that death or serious bodily harm would have to almost certainly arise from the act complained of, and that the defendant appreciated this. A person may still intend to do something even though he does not desire it. Intention is not to be restricted to consequences that are wanted or desired, but includes consequences which a defendant might not want to ensue, but which the jury find (a) are the virtually certain result of the defendant’s actions (barring some unforeseen intervention); and (b) are consequences which the defendant appreciated were virtually certain to occur.

Lord Browne-Wilkinson, Lord Nolan, Lord Steyn, Lord Hoffmann, Lord Hope of Craighead
Times 23-Jul-1998, Gazette 09-Sep-1998, [1998] UKHL 28, [1999] AC 82, [1998] 3 WLR 382, [1998] 4 All ER 103, [1998] Crim LR 890, [1999] 1 Cr App Rep 8
House of Lords, Bailii
Criminal Justice Act 1967 8
England and Wales
Citing:
Appeal from – Regina v Woollin CACD 12-Aug-1996
The defendant threw his child in anger onto a hard surface. He argued that he did not intend the consequences, the death of the child.
Held: A direction from the judge as to the making of an inference of intent from the consequences of an act, . .
Confirmed – Regina v Nedrick CACD 10-Jul-1986
The appellant poured paraffin through the front door of a house and set it alight. In the fire a child died.
Held: Lord Lane CJ considered whether a simple direction to the jury on intent to either kill or to do serious bodily harm was . .
Cited – Regina v Cunningham HL 8-Jul-1981
A defendant may be convicted of murder if it is established either (1) that he had an intent to kill or (2) that he had an intent to cause really serious bodily injury.
Intention is a state of mind which can never be proved as a fact. It can . .
Cited – Regina v Powell (Anthony) and Another; Regina v English HL 30-Oct-1997
When the court looked at the issue of foreseeability of murder in an allegation of joint enterprise, there was no requirement to show intent by the secondary party. The forseeability of the risk of the principal committing the offence from the point . .
Cited – Director of Public Prosecutions v Smith HL 1960
The defendant tried to avoid arrest and killed a policeman by driving off with the policeman clinging to the car.
Held: (1) The defendant committed murder because death or grievous bodily harm was foreseen by him as a ‘likely’ result of his . .
Cited – Regina v Hyam HL 1974
The defendant had burnt down the house of her rival in love, thereby killing her children. The judge directed the jury to convict the defendant of murder if she knew that it was highly probable that her act would cause death or serious bodily harm. . .
Cited – Regina v Moloney HL 21-Mar-1984
The defendant appealed against his conviction for murder.
Held: The appeal was allowed and a conviction for manslaughter substituted.
Lord Bridge of Harwich discussed the case of Hyam: ‘But looking on their facts at the decided cases . .
Cited – Regina v Hancock and Shankland HL 27-Feb-1985
Two miners on strike had pushed a concrete block from a bridge onto a three-lane highway on which a miner was being taken to work by taxi. The concrete block hit the taxi and killed the driver. The defendants were charged with murder. They said they . .
Cited – Attorney-General’s Reference (No 3 of 1994) HL 24-Jul-1997
The defendant stabbed a pregnant woman. The child was born prematurely and died. The attack had been directed at the mother, and the proper offence was manslaughter.
Held: The only questions which need to be addressed are (1) whether the act . .

Cited by:
Cited – Atkinson v Regina CACD 7-Nov-2003
The appellant had been convicted of false accounting in the making of false claims for payment for prescriptions, submitting forms which said that the patient was over 60 when she knew they were not. She said she filled the forms in mechanically. . .
Cited – In Re A (Minors) (Conjoined Twins: Medical Treatment); aka In re A (Children) (Conjoined Twins: Surgical Separation) CA 22-Sep-2000
Twins were conjoined (Siamese). Medically, both could not survive, and one was dependent upon the vital organs of the other. Doctors applied for permission to separate the twins which would be followed by the inevitable death of one of them. The . .
Cited – Equality and Human Rights Commission v Prime Minister and Others Admn 3-Oct-2011
The defendant had published a set of guidelines for intelligence officers called upon to detain and interrogate suspects. The defendant said that the guidelines could only be tested against individual real life cases, and that the court should not . .
Cited – Gnango, Regina v SC 14-Dec-2011
The prosecutor appealed against a successful appeal by the defendant against his conviction for murder. He and an opponent had engaged in a street battle using guns. His opponent had shot an innocent passer by. The court was now asked as to whether . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.135187

It is sufficient to raise a prima facie case of murder (subject to entire or partial excuses such as self-defence or provocation) for it to be proved that the defendant did the act which caused the death intending to kill the victim or to cause him at least grievous bodily harm.

[1974] UKHL 2, [1975] AC 55
Bailii
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Attorney-General’s Reference (No 3 of 1994) HL 24-Jul-1997
The defendant stabbed a pregnant woman. The child was born prematurely and died. The attack had been directed at the mother, and the proper offence was manslaughter.
Held: The only questions which need to be addressed are (1) whether the act . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.248607

[2006] EWCA Crim 1985
Bailii
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Stott, Regina (on The Application of) v Secretary of State for Justice SC 28-Nov-2018
Extended Determinate Sentence created Other Status
The prisoner was subject to an extended determinate sentence (21 years plus 4) for 10 offences of rape. He complained that as such he would only be eligible for parole after serving two thirds of his sentence rather than one third, and said that . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.270252

(Jamaica) Self defence permits a defendant to use such force as is reasonable in the circumstances as he honestly believed them to be. ‘If then a genuine belief, albeit without reasonable grounds, is a defence to rape because it negatives the necessary intention, so also must a genuine belief in facts which if true would justify self-defence be a defence to a crime of personal violence because the belief negatives the intent to act unlawfully.’ At a practical level, where there are no reasonable grounds to hold a belief it will only exceptionally that a jury will conclude that such a belief was or might have been held. Lord Griffiths said: ‘There may be a fear that the abandonment of the objective standard demanded by the existence of reasonable grounds for belief will result in the success of too many spurious claims of self defence. The English experience has shown this not to be the case.’

Lord Griffiths
[1987] 3 WLR 611, (1987) 85 Cr App R 378, [1987] 3 All ER 425, [1988] 1 AC 130, [1987] UKPC 1, [1987] UKPC 17
Bailii, Bailii
Commonwealth
Citing:
Applied – Regina v Morgan HL 30-Apr-1975
The defendants appealed against their convictions for rape, denying mens rea and asserting a belief (even if mistaken) that the victim had consented.
Held: For a defence of mistake to succeed, the mistake must have been honestly made and need . .
Applied – Regina v Williams (Gladstone) CACD 28-Nov-1983
The defendant believed that the person whom he assaulted was unlawfully assaulting a third party. That person was a police officer, who said he was arresting the other, but did not show his warrant card.
Held: The court considered the issue of . .
Rejected – Regina v Chisam CCA 1963
A defendant’s belief founding a plea of self defence must be both honest and reasonable. A sufficient justification was established if the accused genuinely believed on reasonable grounds that a relative or friend was in imminent danger of injury, . .
Rejected – Regina v Fennell CACD 1971
A father was accused of assaulting a police constable in order to release his son from custody. He pleaded self defence, saying that he had believed the arrest unlawful.
Held: The defence failed. A defendant seeking to justify an assault, . .
Approved – Regina v Williams CACD 1986
The defendant was charged with threatening to kill.
Held: Evidence of previous threatening and violent conduct of Williams towards the victim was rightly admitted to establish an intention on the part of the defendant that the victim should . .

Cited by:
Cited – Martin v Regina CACD 30-Oct-2001
The defendant had shot a burglar who had entered his isolated home at night. He claimed self defence, but the burglar appeared to have been shot as he retreated. A defendant is entitled to use reasonable force to protect himself, others for whom he . .
Cited – Regina v G and R HL 16-Oct-2003
The defendants, young boys, had set fire to paper and thrown the lit papers into a wheelie bin, expecting the fire to go out. In fact substantial damage was caused. The House was asked whether a conviction was proper under the section where the . .
Cited – B (A Minor) v Director of Public Prosecutions HL 23-Feb-2000
Prosecution to prove absence of genuine belief
To convict a defendant under the 1960 Act, the prosecution had the burden of proving the absence of a genuine belief in the defendant’s mind that the victim was 14 or over. The Act itself said nothing about any mental element, so the assumption must . .
Cited – Regina v Scarlett CACD 18-May-1993
The force used by the defendant in self defence was justified even though there was a mistake as to the extent to which force was required. ‘If the mental element necessary to prove an assault is an intention to apply unlawful force to the victim, . .
Cited – Director of Public Prosecutions v Armstrong-Braun Admn 5-Oct-1998
A building site was subject to a requirement to move great crested newts before work could proceed. The defendant, a local councillor interfered to prevent a digger destroying the land until the newts had been moved. He appealed his conviction for . .
Cited – Regina v Hatton (Jonathan) CACD 26-Oct-2005
The defendant appealed his conviction for murder saying that his defence of having killed by virtue of a mistake which arose from his self-induced intoxication should have been allowed.
Held: The appeal failed. It had been argued that the . .
Cited – Ashley and Another v Sussex Police CA 27-Jul-2006
The deceased was shot by police officers raiding his flat in 1998. The claimants sought damages for his estate. They had succeeded in claiming damages for false imprisonment, but now appealed dismissal of their claim for damages for assault and . .
Cited – Ashley and Another v Chief Constable of Sussex Police HL 23-Apr-2008
The claimants sought to bring an action for damages after a family member suspected of dealing drugs, was shot by the police. At the time he was naked. The police officer had been acquitted by a criminal court of murder. The chief constable now . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.183213

Dwelling did not include the garden

The DPP appealed by case stated from a decision dismissing a prosecution for racially aggravated use of threatening words or behaviour. Both parties, neighbours, had been in their back gardens when the defendant was said to have shouted racial abuse. The magistrates had accepted a subission that the parties had been inside a dwelling.
Held: The appeal succeeded: ‘the concept of a ‘dwelling’ as defined in section 8 of the 1986 Act, for the purposes of the exception in section 5(2) of that Act, will not include a domestic garden to the front or rear of a dwelling-house. Whether or not this is so will always depend on the particular facts and circumstances of the case in hand. In some cases it will not be so; in others it will. In this case, however, on the simple and uncontroversial facts presented to us, I am of the view that the back garden at 72 – and, likewise, the back garden at 74 – did not come within the section 8 definition of a ‘dwelling’, and that the magistrates were wrong to conclude that it did.’

Lindblom LJ, McGowan DBE J
[2017] EWHC 2244 (Admin)
Bailii
Public Order Act 1986 8
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Regina v Francis; CPS Leicester, Regina v CACD 21-Dec-2006
Whilst in custody in the police station, the defendant was visited by the police surgeon. He was accused of causing racially aggravated harassment, alarm or distress after abusing the doctor. The Crown appealed acceptance of his defence that the . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.594655

The defendant appealed against his conviction for entering part of a building with intent to steal under section 9 of the 1968 Act. He had gone into a department store during normal opening hours, but then hid himself behind a partition where, finding a till, he opened the drawer looking for something to steal.
Held: The appeal failed. The partition worked to represent that what was behind it was ‘part of a building’ from which the public had been impliedly excluded. The defendant knew and understood this, and was a trespasser as regards that part of the building.

(1979) 68 Cr App R 427
Theft Act 1968 9(1)(a)
England and Wales

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.539565

The court considered the need to establish mens rea where it was dealing with something which was one of a class of acts which ‘are not criminal in any real sense, but are acts which in the public interest are prohibited under a penalty’, and ‘There is a presumption that mens rea, an evil intention, or a knowledge of the wrongfulness of the act, is an essential ingredient in every offence; but that presumption is liable to be displaced either by the words of the statute creating the offence or by the subject-matter with which it deals.’ The court discussed offences where mens rea might not be required: ‘Another class comprehends some, and perhaps all, public nuisances: R v Stephens where the employer was held liable on indictment for a nuisance caused by workmen without his knowledge and contrary to his orders; and so in R v Medley and Barnes v Akroyd. Lastly, there may be cases in which, although the proceeding is criminal in form, it is really only a summary mode of enforcing a civil right: see per Williams and Willes JJ in Morden v Porter, as to unintentional trespass in pursuit of game; Lee v Simpson, as to unconscious dramatic piracy; and Hargreaves v Diddams, as to a bona fide belief in a legally impossible right to fish.’

Wright J
[1895-99] All ER 1167; 11 TLR 369, 72 LT 839, [1895] UKLawRpKQB 77, [1895] 1 QB 918
Commonlii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Regina v Stephens 1866
The court was asked whether the owner of a slate quarry was answerable for a public nuisance caused by his workmen without his knowledge and contrary to his general orders.
Held: Mellor J: ‘It is quite true that this in point of form is a . .

Cited by:
Cited – Sweet v Parsley HL 23-Jan-1969
Mens Rea essential element of statutory Offence
The appellant had been convicted under the Act 1965 of having been concerned in the management of premises used for smoking cannabis. This was a farmhouse which she visited infrequently. The prosecutor had conceded that she was unaware that the . .
Cited – Regina v K HL 25-Jul-2001
In a prosecution for an offence of indecent assault on a girl under 16 under the section, it was necessary for the prosecution to prove the absence of a positive belief in the defendant’s mind that the victim was 16 or over. The legislation history . .
Cited – Regina v Rimmington; Regina v Goldstein HL 21-Jul-2005
Common Law – Public Nuisance – Extent
The House considered the elements of the common law offence of public nuisance. One defendant faced accusations of having sent racially offensive materials to individuals. The second was accused of sending an envelope including salt to a friend as a . .
Confirmed – Gammon (Hong Kong) Ltd v A-G of Hong Kong PC 1984
Lord Scarman expressed the purpose of imposing strict liability within criminal law: ‘In their Lordships’ opinion, the law relevant to this appeal may be stated in the following propositions . . : (1) there is a presumption of law that mens rea is . .
Cited – Derbyshire v Houliston QBD 11-May-1897
The appellant was charged, under s. 27 of the Sale of Food and Drugs Act, 1875, with giving a false warranty in writing to a purchaser in respect of an article of food sold by the appellant. When the appellant sold the article he did not know, and . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.219637

(High Court of Australia) The court was asked whether an individual carrying a formaldehyde spray possessed it ‘for a lawful purpose’.
Held: She did not do so even though it was a purpose not prohibited by law, namely self defence: ”Lawful purpose’ in [the relevant legislation] should be read as a purpose that is authorised, as opposed to not forbidden, by law because that meaning best gives effect to the object of the section. The meaning of ‘lawful’ depends on its context, as Napier J pointed out in Crafter v Kelly [[1941] SASR 237 at 243]. As a result, a ‘lawful purpose’ may mean a purpose not forbidden by law or not unlawful under the statute that enacts the term . . ; or it can mean a purpose that is supported by a positive rule of law . .
As a general rule, interpreting ‘lawful purpose’ in a legislative provision to mean a purpose that is not forbidden, rather than positively authorised, by law is the interpretation that best gives effect to the legislative purpose of the enactment. This is because statutes are interpreted in accordance with the presumption that Parliament does not take away existing rights unless it does so expressly or by necessary implication . . Nevertheless, the purpose, context or subject matter of a legislative provision may indicate that Parliament has used the term ‘lawful purpose’ to mean a purpose that is positively authorised by law.’

Brennan CJ
(1996) 186 CLR 454, [1996] HCA 28, (1996) 139 ALR 386, (1996) 70 ALJR 960
Austlii
Australia
Cited by:
Cited – Szoma v Secretary of State for the Department of Work and Pensions HL 28-Jul-2005
The applicant had claimed asylum on entry and was temporarily admitted. Though his claim for asylum was later refused, those admitted in this way were granted indefinite leave to remain. He had claimed and received benefits at first, but then these . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.231609

The defendant surgeon was said to have made false claims for payment for operations, and was charged under the 1968 Act. He claimed to have been entitled to the sums claimed, and denied that he had been dishonest. The court considered the meaning of dishonesty.
Held: His appeal failed. Dishonesty is a state of the mind rather than a course of conduct. The views of the jury as to whether an Act was dishonest could not make an Act dishonest if it was not dishonest in the defendant’s mind. The test was not purely objective, but to accept an unvarnished subjective test would be to abandon all standards but those of the accused himself. Accordingly, a jury must first of all decide whether according to the ordinary standards of reasonable and honest people what was done was dishonest. If it was dishonest by those standards, then the jury must consider whether the defendant himself must have realised that what he was doing was by those standards dishonest.
Lord Lane CJ said: ‘In determining whether the Prosecution has proved that the defendant was acting dishonestly, a jury must first of all decide whether according to the ordinary standards of reasonable and honest people what was done was dishonest. If it was not dishonest by those standards, that is the end of the matter and the prosecution fails. If it was dishonest by those standards, then the jury must consider whether the defendant himself must have realised that what he was doing was by those standards dishonest. In most cases, where the actions are obviously dishonest by ordinary standards, there will be no doubt about it. It will be obvious that the defendant himself knew that he was acting dishonestly. It is dishonest for a defendant to act in a way which he knows ordinary people consider to be dishonest, even if he asserts or genuinely believes that he is morally justified in acting as he did.’

Lord Lane CJ, Lloyd, Eastham JJ
[1982] 1 QB 1053, (1982) 75 Cr App R 154, [1982] 2 All ER 689, [1982] EWCA Crim 2, [1982] 3 WLR 110
Bailii
Theft Act 1968 1
England and Wales
Citing:
Considered – Regina v Greenstein; Regina v Green CACD 1975
Meaning of dishonesty under the 1968 Act. . .
Dicta disapproved – Regina v McIvor CA 1982
The defendant had been refused a loan by his employers. He took the money anyway from the till and repaid it. On discovery he was charged with theft. He denied that he had been dishonest. He had always intended to repay it and had done so. He . .
Cited – Regina v Feely CACD 1973
In relation to a charge of theft where the issue of dishonesty is raised, the issue must be left to the jury. Dishonesty is not a matter of law, but a jury question of fact and standards. Except to the limited extent that section 2 of the Theft Act . .
Considered – Regina v Landy; Regina v White etc CACD 1982
The defendants appealed against convictions for conspiracy to defraud. The three were bank employees including the chairman, and between them managed to take money from the bank by different forms of malpractice. The defendants denied dishonesty, . .

Cited by:
Cited – Regina v Roberts (William) CACD 1987
A Ghosh direction can be misleading for a jury. . .
Cited – Regina v Price CACD 1990
In most cases where dishonesty is alleged, a Ghosh direction is not only unnecessary but also misleading. . .
Cited – Atkinson v Regina CACD 7-Nov-2003
The appellant had been convicted of false accounting in the making of false claims for payment for prescriptions, submitting forms which said that the patient was over 60 when she knew they were not. She said she filled the forms in mechanically. . .
Cited – Twinsectra Ltd v Yardley and Others HL 21-Mar-2002
Solicitors acted in a loan, giving an undertaking as to its application. In breach of that undertaking they released it to the borrower. The appellants appealed a finding of liability as contributors to the breach.
Held: ‘Money in a . .
Cited – Harrison v Teton Valley Trading Co; Harrison’s Trade Mark Application (CHINAWHITE) CA 27-Jul-2004
The applicant had been an employee of the objector at their nightclub ‘Chinawhite’ and whose principal attraction was a cocktail of the same name. Employees signed a confidentiality agreement as to the recipe. Having left the employment, the . .
Cited – Wheatley and Another v The Commissioner of Police of the British Virgin Islands PC 4-May-2006
(The British Virgin Islands) The defendants appealed against convictions for theft and misconduct. Being civil servants they had entered in to contract with companies in which they had interests. . .
Cited – Department for Work and Pensions v Courts Admn 3-May-2006
The appellant challenged stays of proceedings by the respondent magistrates court for abuse of process infringing the defendants’ human right to a fair trial. The magistrates had fund that being faced with dismissal of a summary case through delay, . .
Cited – Regina v Awoyomi CACD 14-Jan-1997
The defendant appealed against her conviction and sentence. The court had refused to admit medical evidence that she might be unfit to continue her trial.
Held: It would be rare to admit evidence which might support a Ghosh direction. The . .
Cited – Hashman and Harrup v The United Kingdom ECHR 25-Nov-1999
The defendants had been required to enter into a recognisance to be of good behaviour after disrupting a hunt by blowing of a hunting horn. They were found to have unlawfully caused danger to the dogs. Though there had been no breach of the peace, . .
Cited – John Lewis Plc v T L Coyne EAT 7-Dec-2000
An employee had been dismissed for making private telephone calls at work, against company policy. The dismissal had been based upon the general assessment that making such calls was dishonest.
Held: The employer’s appeal failed. The procedure . .
Cited – Regina v George and Others CACD 28-May-2010
The defendants were senior executives of BA. They made interlocutory appeals while undergoing trials for alleged price fixing under section 188 of the 2002 Act. The judge had ruled that the prosecutor need prove dishonesty only as against the . .
Cited – Regina v Clarke CACD 2-Apr-1996
Several people had lost large sums of mony by a fraud. The defendant had approached them offering his services as a private investigator to seek to recover their money. He pleaded guilty to one allegation of deception after an indication from the . .
Cited – Regina v O’Connell CACD 1992
The appellant and his wife appliied for loans to buy residential properties to be let to obtain a rental income covering most of the mortgage payments. The properties were later sold to take advantages of increases in value. A sum of andpound;1.5 . .
Cited – Gandhi Tandoori Restaurant v Customs and Excise Commissioners VDT 1989
The court considered the use of R v Ghosh when considering whether dishonesty had been established under section 13 of the 1983 Act, saying: ‘It is to be observed that in section 13(1) the first requirement for liability to a penalty is that the . .
Cited – Zen Internet Ltd v Customs and Excise VDT 5-Apr-2004
VDT VALUE ADDED TAX – dishonest evasion – VATA s 60 – appellant paying six successive centrally-issued assessments for less than the true liability – inadequate attempts to put accounting records in order – . .
Cited – Ivey v Genting Casinos UK Ltd (T/A Crockfords Club) QBD 8-Oct-2014
The claimant, a professional gambler, sued the defendant casino for his winnings. The club replied that the claimant’s methods amounted to a form of cheating, and that no liability arose to pay the winnings.
Held: The claim failed. ‘The fact . .
Cited – Ivey v Genting Casinos UK Ltd (T/A Crockfords Club) CA 4-Nov-2016
The claimant sought recovery of his substantial winnings from the defendant gaming club. The club had resisted saying that the methods used by the claimant at cards, called, ‘edge sorting’ was a form of cheating, a criminal offence within the . .
Overruled – Ivey v Genting Casinos (UK) Ltd (T/A Crockfords) SC 25-Oct-2017
The claimant gambler sought payment of his winnings. The casino said that he had operated a system called edge-sorting to achieve the winnings, and that this was a form of cheating so as to excuse their payment. The system exploited tiny variances . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.187645

The appellant had placed a bet at a betting shop on a certain horse. A horse with a similar name won, but by mistake the shop paid out on the bet. The appellant knew of the mistake, but refused to return the winnings. He now appealed against his conviction for theft. He said that the chairman had been wrong to say that at the moment the money had been paid over it had not belonged to him. He offered the view that whereas it would clearly be wrong to keep such an overpayment if made by the grocer, bookmakers were fair game.
Held: The appeal failed. The Deputy Chairman, having referred to this evidence, and to evidence that the Defendant had not hurried away from the betting shop after receiving this large sum, said, ‘Well, it is a matter for you to consider, Members of the Jury, but try and place yourselves in that man’s position at that time and answer the question whether in your view he thought he was acting honestly or dishonestly.’ In our view that was in the circumstances of this case a proper and sufficient direction on the matter of dishonesty. On the face of it the Appellant’s conduct was dishonest: the only possible basis on which the jury could find that the prosecution had not established dishonesty would be if they thought it possible that the Appellant did have the belief which he claimed to have.

Cairns, Stephenson LJJ, Willis J
[1972] 1 WLR 1341, 136 JP 777, [1972] 3 All ER 280, [1972] EWCA Crim 2, (1972) 6 Cr App Rep 734
Bailii
Theft Act 1968 1
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Morgan v Ashcroft CA 1937
A gift may be recovered where it was made under the mistaken belief that the donee is someone else. The mistake must be as to a fact which, if true, would create a liability to pay .
Scott LJ said of the Kerrison case that ‘it was definitely . .
Cited – Moynes v Cooper 1956
moynes_cooper1956
A workman received a paypacket containing andpound;7 more than was due to him but did not become aware of the overpayment till he opened the envelope some time later. He then kept the andpound;7.
Held: Where the accused received property . .

Cited by:
Cited – Ivey v Genting Casinos (UK) Ltd (T/A Crockfords) SC 25-Oct-2017
The claimant gambler sought payment of his winnings. The casino said that he had operated a system called edge-sorting to achieve the winnings, and that this was a form of cheating so as to excuse their payment. The system exploited tiny variances . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.249928

The defendant appealed against his conviction for assault. He had picked up a sex worker, driven away, but then changed his mind, and forcibly removed her from the car when she delayed. He now argued that he had the same right at common law to remove her from trespassing in his car as he would if she was in his house.
Held: The appeal failed. The implicit agreement was that, having driven away for some distance, he would return her. He had not been acting in self-defence. The law should be reluctant to extend the civil remedy of self help to occasions which might come to violence. There had been no need or right to resort to violence in this case, he could simply have done what he had agreed to do, to return her to where they had started.

Lord Judge LCJ
[2010] EWCA Crim 1023, [2010] WLR (D) 110, [2010] 2 Cr App R 16, [2010] Crim LR 767
Bailii, Times, WLRD
Offences Against the Person Act 1861 47
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Rex v Tabbart 1693
The plaintiff desired the defendant who had come into his house to leave it and accordingly commanded that his wife put the defendant out, molliter manus imposuit – using the minimum force necessary. . .
Cited – Lloyd v Director of Public Prosecutions QBD 1992
Mr Lloyd had parked his car in a private car park with five large notices boards located at the entrance to and exit of this private car park positioned at eye-level for car drivers. All those notices warned that unauthorised vehicles would be . .
Cited – Southwark London Borough Council v Williams CA 1971
No Defence of Homelessness to Squatters
The defendants, in dire need of housing accommodation entered empty houses owned by the plaintiff local authority as squatters. The court considered the defence of necessity.
Held: The proper use of abandoned council properties is best . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.416048

Summons granted for political lies allegation

(Westminster Magistrates Court) The court gave its reasons for acceding to a request for the issue of a summons requiring the defendant to answer a charge for three offences alleging misconduct in a public office.
Held: There was prima facie evidence of an issue to be determined at trial in relation to this aspect of the offence. The request for the summons was granted.

Coleman DJ
[2019] EW Misc 15 (MagC)
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Regina v West London Metropolitan Stipendiary Magistrate, ex parte Klahn QBD 1979
The issue of a summons by a magistrate is a judicial act: ‘The duty of a magistrate in considering an application for the issue of a summons is to exercise a judicial discretion in deciding whether or not to issue a summons. It would appear that he . .
Cited – Regina v Worthing Justices, ex parte Norvell QBD 1981
The applicants requested the magistrates court to issue summonses for a private prosecution on two allegations of perjury. The request was dealt with by the Justices’ Clerk, who refused it. He asked the other Justices to reconsider the request, and . .
Cited – Regina v G and R HL 16-Oct-2003
The defendants, young boys, had set fire to paper and thrown the lit papers into a wheelie bin, expecting the fire to go out. In fact substantial damage was caused. The House was asked whether a conviction was proper under the section where the . .
Cited – Attorney General’s Reference (No 3 of 2003) CACD 7-Apr-2004
Police Officers had been acquitted of misconduct in public office. They had stood by in a police station custody suite as a prisoner lay on the floor and died.
Held: The trial took place before R -v- G which had overruled Caldwell. The . .
Cited – Mitchell, Regina v CACD 12-Feb-2014
‘Is a paramedic employed by a National Health Service Trust in its ambulance service the holder of a public office so as to be subject to criminal sanction for misconduct?’
Held: The appeal succeeded; he was not: ‘the nature of the duty . .
Cited – D Ltd v A and Others CACD 28-Jul-2017
The complainant had had issued a summons against the defendants alleging fraud. They in turn applied for the summonses to be set aside on the ground of abuse. That having been granted, the complainant sought to have the terminating ruling set aside. . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.638247

Spitting on a police officer’s coat was held to be such a minor ‘damage’ to the coat as not to be criminal damage within the meaning of the 1971 Act at all. Though spitting on a raincoat which was likely to be cleaned easily with a damp cloth did not amount to damage, the same act on a delicate garment, such as a wedding dress, might well have resulted in damage. A thing is damaged if it is rendered imperfect or inoperative.

[1978] Crim LR 689
Criminal Damage Act 1971 1
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Howarth v Commissioner of Police of The Metropolis QBD 3-Nov-2011
howarth_cmpQBD2011
The claimant sought judicial review of a decision to search him whilst travelling to a public protest in London. A previous demonstration involving this group had resulted in criminal damage, but neither the claimant nor his companions were found to . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.448317

Parliamentary Records Admiisible

The defendant had left his hotel without paying, and was charged with making off without payment. He said he intended to pay the bill later after making some business transactions. The judge had directed the jury that the intent to avoid payment need not be permanent.
Held: The House could look to the Law Commission report which had led to the Act in order to determine the mischief, but not to interpret the section as enacted. On the words of the section an intention to deprive had to be permanent in order to come within the section. The appeal succeeded.
The court allowed the defendant’s appeal after he was convicted of leaving his hotel without making payment, and certified a question for the House of Lords: ‘Upon a construction of the words with intent to avoid payment’ in section 3(1) of the Theft Act 1978, namely, whether an intention to make permanent default on payment is required.’
Held: The Court of Appeal judgment was approved.
Boreham J said: ‘To secure a conviction under section 3 the following must be proved: (1) that the defendant in fact made off without making payment on the spot; (2) the following mental elements – (a) knowledge that payment on the spot was required or expected of him; and (b) dishonesty; and (c) intent to avoid payment [sc. ‘of the amount due’].’ and

”If (c) means, or is taken to include, no more than an intention to delay or defer payment of the amount due it is difficult to see what it adds to the other elements. Anyone who knows that payment on the spot is expected or required of him and who then dishonestly makes off without paying as required or expected must have at least the intention to delay or defer payment. It follows, therefore, that the conjoined phrase ‘and with intent to avoid payment of the amount due’ adds a further ingredient – an intention to do more than delay or defer – an intention to evade payment altogether.’ and

‘Finally, we can see no reason why, if the intention of Parliament was to provide, in effect, that an intention to delay or defer payment might suffice, Parliament should not have said so in explicit terms. This might have been achieved by the insertion of the word ‘such’ before payment in the phrase in question. It would have been achieved by a grammatical reconstruction of the material part of section 3(1) thus, ‘dishonestly makes off without having paid and with intent to avoid payment of the amount due as required or expected.’ To accede to the Crown’s submission’ would be to read the section as if it were constructed in that way. That we cannot do. Had it been intended to relate the intention to avoid ‘payment’ to ‘payment as required or expected’ it would have been easy to say so. The section does not say so. At the very least it contains an equivocation which should be resolved in favour of the appellant.’

Lord Hailsham LC, Lord Scarman, Lord Diplock, Lord Bridge of Harwich, Lord Brightman
[1985] 3 WLR 107, [1984] UKHL 6, [1985] AC 1029, [1984] 2 All ER 641, [1985] 1 WLR 50
Bailii
Theft Act 1978 3
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Director of Public Prosecutions v Ray HL 25-Jul-1973
The defendant ordered a meal at a restaurant believing his companion would lend him the money to pay. He later decided to seek to avoid payment and took a opportunity to escape.
Held: The appeal was allowed and the conviction restored. The . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.198902

Appeal by way of case stated following a ruling as to the meaning of ‘animal fighting’ within s.8 of the 2006 Act in the context of a prosecution by the Appellant (‘the RSPCA’) against various individuals said to be members of a group known as the ‘Devon Destroyers’.
Held: ‘a) The District Judge was correct in deciding (by reference to and on the basis of the assumed facts) that in order for an offence of animal fighting to be committed contrary to section 8 of the Act as defined by section 8(7) thereof, that the other animal, with which a protected animal is placed, has to be the subject of some control or restraint by some person or persons connected with that activity or some other artificial constraint so that its ability to escape is prevented;
b) The District Judge was correct in considering that the tenet of section 8 of the Act is aimed at organised and controlled animal fights, such as dog fights. In so far as he held that money had invariably to be involved for there to be an offence under section 8 of the Act, he was incorrect.’

Bean LJ, Carr DBE J
[2016] EWHC 928 (Admin)
Bailii
Animal Welfare Act 2006 8

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.563224

The appellants said that they had been entrapped into committing the offences of which they stood convicted. Their applications for stay on the ground of abuse of process had been rejected.
Held: The appeal failed.
Rix Lj said: ‘the burden of proof is on the applicant defendant, albeit the standard is only that of the balance of probabilities. Unless the relevant facts are agreed, or are assumed for the purposes of argument, it may be necessary therefore for an applicant to give evidence in a voir dire, or to cross-examine the undercover officers as to their conduct or for there to be at least agreed assumptions as to the facts. If Ms Moore wished to say, as was submitted on her behalf, that it was a clear, albeit unspoken, premise of her relationship with the undercover officers that they were taking advantage of her vulnerability and innocence to lure her into offending by the temptation of cheap goods, and that the recordings of their conversations did not reflect the true circumstances as they had to be understood, then it was for her to initiate the necessary evidence and cross-examination.’ and
‘we have been unable to say that the judge was wrong to conclude that on the facts of this case the application to stay the proceedings for abuse of process had not been made out. The conduct of the undercover officers was not so seriously improper as to bring the administration of justice into disrepute and there is no affront to the public conscience in these prosecutions.’

Rix LJ, MacKay, Underhill JJ
[2013] EWCA Crim 85
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Regina v Looseley (orse Loosely); Attorney General’s Reference No 3 of 2000 HL 25-Oct-2001
Police Entrapment is no defence to Criminal Act
The defendant complained of his conviction for supplying controlled drugs, saying that the undercover police officer had requested him to make the supply.
Held: It was an abuse of process for the police to go so far as to incite a crime.
Cited – Regina v Chandler CACD 2002
The Court of Appeal will not interfere with the trial judge’s assessment of the facts unless there has been shown to have been a serious error. . .
Cited – Regina v Harmes and Another CACD 9-May-2006
The appellant Harmes ran a public house and was suspected of involvement in the distribution of Class A drugs and money laundering. An undercover police operation was launched and approved which lasted approximately 3 months. One of the undercover . .
Cited – Regina v Latif; Regina v Shahzad HL 23-Jan-1996
The defendant had been lured into the UK by the unlawful acts of customs officers. He claimed abuse of process.
Held: The category of cases in which the abuse of process principles can be applied is not closed. A customs officer committing an . .
Cited – Regina v Moon CACD 10-Nov-2004
The defendant, a heroin addict said that the encouragement of a police officer to supply her with a small quantity of heroin amounted to entrapment and that her prosecution should have been stayed as an abuse of process. The officer had been . .
Cited – Regina v Moon CACD 10-Nov-2004
The defendant, a heroin addict said that the encouragement of a police officer to supply her with a small quantity of heroin amounted to entrapment and that her prosecution should have been stayed as an abuse of process. The officer had been . .
Cited – Jones, Regina v CACD 29-Apr-2010
The defendant appealed against his conviction for incitement to produce cannabis. He had a shop openly and lawfully selling materials for use in the growing of plants, and particularly cannabis. He said that the offence had only occurred after the . .
Cited – Teixeira De Castro v Portugal ECHR 9-Jun-1998
Mr De Castro had been the target of an unwarranted, unauthorised, unsupervised police operation in which undercover officers incited him to supply drugs. He challenged a conviction for trafficking in heroin, based mainly on statements of two police . .
Cited – M, Regina v CACD 18-Mar-2011
The prosecutor appealed against a ruling that the prosecution was an abuse of process, the defendant having said that the police officer had entrapped him into committing the offence of supplying a Class A drug. A police undercover drugs operation . .
Cited – Regina v Brett CACD 2005
. .
Cited – Regina v Paulssen CACD 2003
The defendant appealed against his conviction for a ‘contract killing’.
Held: The Court of Appeal should not interfere with factual conclusions reached in the court below save in the clearest of situations. The court was prepared to overlook . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.470947

The defendant had been convicted of rape and had served his sentence. On a reference from the Criminal Cases Review Commission, he appealed saying that new evidence which was relevant and admissible had come to light.
Held: The safety of the conviction was undermined, and the conviction was set aside. There was to be a new trial, and the court was restrictive in the details it presented.

Lady Justice Hallett
Judiciary
Criminal Appeal Act 1995 9
England and Wales

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.562554

The prosecutor appealed against a ruling that the prosecution was an abuse of process, the defendant having said that the police officer had entrapped him into committing the offence of supplying a Class A drug. A police undercover drugs operation was in progress in the North West of England in the course of which M had been targeted by an undercover officer. A ‘bond of trust and friendship had been cultivated’, and the officer had bought alcohol for M in shops from which M had been banned. The officer knew that M was an addict who would have sources of supply, but he had never been convicted of supplying drugs. He asked M where he could source some ‘white’ in the town centre of Blackburn. M mentioned a dealer and the two telephoned him. M ordered a wrap of white and a wrap of brown for the officer: a car drove up, M obtained the wraps and handed them to the officer. This was the only deal in question.
Held: The appeal succeeded.
Stanley Burnton LJ said: ‘there is no significant distinction between the assumed facts of the present case and the facts of Loosely. It is an inherent aspect of any undercover police operation that the undercover police officer insinuates himself into the confidence of those involved in the criminal conduct at which the operation is directed. For an officer who has so insinuated himself to offer an opportunity to a defendant to commit a criminal offence, in the absence of persuasion or pressure or the offer of a significant inducement, will not generally result in its being an abuse of the process to prosecute the person who takes that opportunity to commit an offence.’
It would have been sensible for the judge to do as suggested and to have first heard the evidence of the police officer involved.

Stanley Burnton LJ, Eady, Foskett JJ
[2011] EWCA Crim 648
Bailii
Criminal Justice Act 2003 58
England and Wales
Citing:
Applied – Regina v Looseley (orse Loosely); Attorney General’s Reference No 3 of 2000 HL 25-Oct-2001
Police Entrapment is no defence to Criminal Act
The defendant complained of his conviction for supplying controlled drugs, saying that the undercover police officer had requested him to make the supply.
Held: It was an abuse of process for the police to go so far as to incite a crime.
Cited – Regina v Harmes and Another CACD 9-May-2006
The appellant Harmes ran a public house and was suspected of involvement in the distribution of Class A drugs and money laundering. An undercover police operation was launched and approved which lasted approximately 3 months. One of the undercover . .

Cited by:
Cited – Regina v Moore and Another CACD 13-Feb-2013
The appellants said that they had been entrapped into committing the offences of which they stood convicted. Their applications for stay on the ground of abuse of process had been rejected.
Held: The appeal failed.
Rix Lj said: ‘the . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.430666

The defendant was accused of possession of drugs. The drugs in question had been medically prescribed by the defendant’s doctor. After he had taken them home he genuinely thought that they had been accidentally destroyed by his mother when washing his jeans. Thereafter he discovered them still in his bedroom drawer where later still they were found by the police.
Held: The appeal was allowed. The possession once lawful, remained lawful. Phillimore LJ said: ‘If you have got it in your custody and you put it in some safe place and then forget that you have got it, and discover a year or two later, when you happen to look into that particular receptacle that it is still there, it seems to this court idle to suggest that during those two years it has not been in your possession. It has been there under your hand and control. There is no limbo into which the article can go if recollection dims.’

Phillimore LJ
[1972] 1 WLR 64
England and Wales
Cited by:
Not Cited – Regina v Martindale CACD 1986
Possession does not depend upon the alleged possessor’s powers of memory. Nor does possession come and go as memory revives or fails. ‘In the judgment of this court [that the argument that lack of memory or knowledge negatives possession is . .
Cited – Jolie v Regina CACD 23-May-2003
The appellant had been convicted of having a pointed article with him in a public place. He said that the car he was driving had needed an instrument to operate the lock. At first he had used a knife, but then used scissors, losing the knife in the . .
Cited – Bayliss, Regina (on the Application of) v Director of Public Prosecutions Admn 6-Feb-2003
The defendant was arrested in Tescos. On being searched he was found to have a lock knife. He had placed it in his belt and forgotten about it. He appealed conviction saying it had not been shown that he knew he still had the knife.
Held: . .
Cited – McCalla, Regina v CACD 1988
A cosh had been found in the glove compartment of the appellant’s car. He said he had picked it up a month earlier, had put it away and had forgotten about it.
Held: The court reviewed the authorities on what constituted possession. Once . .
Cited – Atkins v Director of Public Prosecutions; Goodland v Director of Public Prosecutions Admn 8-Mar-2000
For possession of an indecent image of a child to be proved, it was necessary to establish some knowledge of its existence. Images stored without the defendant’s knowledge by browser software in a hidden cache, of which he was also unaware, were not . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.182748

G was to stand trial for possession of articles useful for terrorism. Whilst in prison, he collected and created diagrams and information and prepared plans to bomb a local army centre. When arrested he said he had done so to upset the prison officers. He suffered paranoid schizophrenia. It had been held that his mental condition could not amount to a reasonable excuse. J had been found in possession of digital materials on training for terrorism, for which he gave several excuses according to their nature.
Held: The appeals by the Crown succeeded. To establish the offence under section 58 it was not necessary to show that the defendant had collected the materials for a terrorist related purpose. Lord Rodger said that a person ‘can commit an offence under subsection 58(1) in either of two ways. First, he commits an offence if he collects or makes a record of information of a kind likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism. There are allegations to that effect against both Mr G and Mr J. Secondly, he commits an offence if he possesses a document or record containing information of that kind. There is an allegation to that effect against Mr J. ‘ The defendant must be shown to have been in possession of the articles, and to have known the content.
Under section 57, the defendant’s purpose was also to be established.

Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers, Lord Rodger of Earlsferry, Baroness Hale of Richmond, Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood and Lord Mance
[2010] 1 AC 43, [2009] 2 WLR 724, [2009] 2 Cr App Rep 4, [2009] 2 All ER 409, [2009] UKHL 13, [2010] AC 43
Bailii, HL, Times
Terrorism Act 2000 57 58 118
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Zafar and others v Regina CACD 13-Feb-2008
The defendants appealed against their convictions for possessing articles for a terrorist purpose. . .
Cited – J v Regina CACD 2008
. .
Cited – Sweet v Parsley HL 23-Jan-1969
Mens Rea essential element of statutory Offence
The appellant had been convicted under the Act 1965 of having been concerned in the management of premises used for smoking cannabis. This was a farmhouse which she visited infrequently. The prosecutor had conceded that she was unaware that the . .
Cited – Regina v Berry (No 3) CACD 1993
If there are several grounds of appeal, the Court of Appeal can decide whether the other grounds are to be considered.
The Court of Appeal is to note any unresolved issues after a case has decided on one point only.
Lord Taylor CJ . .
Appeal from – G v Regina CACD 29-Apr-2008
Appeal by defendant in terrorist trial against ruling at preparatory hearing that he had no reasonable excuse defence. . .
Cited – K v Regina CACD 13-Feb-2008
The Court considered the nature of the documents which fall within the section and, secondly, the scope of the defence of reasonable excuse under section 58(3).
Held: ‘A document or record will only fall within section 58 if it is of a kind . .
Appeal from – J v Regina CACD 2008
. .
Cited – M, Regina v CACD 7-Feb-2007
. .
Cited – Regina v Director of Public Prosecutions, ex parte Kebilene and others HL 28-Oct-1999
(Orse Kebeline) The DPP’s appeal succeeded. A decision by the DPP to authorise a prosecution could not be judicially reviewed unless dishonesty, bad faith, or some other exceptional circumstance could be shown. A suggestion that the offence for . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.314313

The defendant had been requested by her credit card company to return her credit card and not to use it. She used it again before returning it. She was convicted of obtaining a pecuniary advantage by deception from the store, but her appeal was allowed at the Court of Appeal.
Held: The conviction was restored. Presenting the credit card was a representation that she was authorised by the issuer to make a contract on its behalf.
There was no reason why in cases such as this, where the direct evidence of the witness is not, and cannot reasonably be expected to be available, reliance upon a dishonest representation cannot be sufficiently established by proof of facts from which an irresistible inference of such reliance can be drawn.

Lord Diplock, Lord Fraser of Tullybelton, Lord Russell of Killowen, Lord Keith of Kinkel, Lord Roskill
[1981] UKHL 4, [1982] AC 449, [1981] 2 All ER 776, [1981] 3 WLR 88
Bailii
Theft Act 1968 16(1)
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis v Charles HL 1977
The House was asked as to the dishonest use of a cheque card. The appellant defendant was charged and convicted on two counts of obtaining a pecuniary advantage by deception, contrary to section 16 of the 1968 Act. The Court of Appeal (Criminal . .
Cited – Rex v Sullivan CCA 1945
The court considered the evidence required as to the mind of the victim of a fraud. Humphrys J said: ‘ It is, we think, undoubtedly good law that the question of the inducement acting upon the mind of the person who may be described as the . .
Cited – Regina v Laverty CACD 1970
Lord Parker CJ said at that the Court should be reluctant to extend the principle in Sullivan further than was necessary. The Crown must always prove its case and one element which will always be required to be proved in these cases is the effect of . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.248655

NoControl, No Appropriation

The defendant appealed her conviction for theft of 50,000 pounds which she was overpaid after she had submitted false claims for overtime.
Held: She had not appropriated the money as required by the Act. She had had no control over the making of payments or the account from which payments were made, and payments were made direct into her bank account. Appeal allowed.

Davis LJ, King, Cheema-Grubb JJ
[2018] EWCA Crim 1009, [2018] WLR(D) 285
Bailii, WLRD
Theft Act 1968 1(1) 3
England and Wales

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.624099

The Borough appealed by case stated against the rejection of its prosecution of the respondent on a charge of failing to cause a person to stop smoking at a public shisha lounge. A shisha lounge enables customers to smoke flavoured tobacco using a hookah, which causes the smoke to pass through a water basin.
Held: The appeal failed.

Burnett LJ, Cranston J
[2016] EWHC 720 (Admin)
Bailii
Health Act 2006
England and Wales

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.562891

Consent not removed by Lie as to Vasectomy

The defendant appealed from his conviction of rape. He had represented to his victim that he had had a vasectomy to secure consent which the court found had been vitiated.
Held: The appeal was allowed. Could a lie about fertility negate ostensible consent? The ‘but for’ test was not itself enough to remove consent. The question was whether the lie used to obtain the consent was so closely connected to the nature of sexual intercourse, rather than the broad circumstances surrounding it, that it was capable of negating consent. The lie operated not as to any element of the acts of sex, but rather only to the risks which would be associated. The victim had not been deprived, by the defendant’s lie of the freedom to choose whether to have the sexual intercourse which occurred.
Section 76(2) of the 2003 Act puts on a statutory footing the two well-established common law bases upon which deceit or fraud will vitiate consent, but Parliament did not take the opportunity to go further. The facts of the instant appeal do not fall within either of the categories identified in section 76(2).
The Lord Burnett of Maldon CJ said: ‘Arguments about consent in cases of alleged sexual offending sometimes proceed on the assumption that the meaning of ‘consent’ is a matter for development by the common law. That was the position in the nineteenth century when the seminal cases on impersonation and misconduct during medical examinations were decided. It is no longer the position because consent is defined in section 74 of the 2003 Act, with the evidential presumptions found in section 75 and the conclusive presumptions in section 76. Any novel circumstances must be considered by reference to the statutory definition, namely whether the alleged victim has agreed by choice and has the freedom and capacity to make that choice. ‘

Lord Burnett of Maldon CJ, Cutts, Tipples JJ
[2020] EWCA Crim 971, [2020] WLR(D) 440
Bailii, WLRD
Sexual Offences Act 2003 74
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Regina v Clarence CCCR 20-Nov-1888
The defendant knew that he had gonorrhea. He had intercourse with his wife, and infected her. She would not have consented had she known. He appealed his convictions for assault and causing grievous bodily harm.
Held: ‘The question in this . .
Cited – Regina v Dee 1884
Court of the Crown Cases Reserved of Ireland – May CJ (who had also been the trial judge), set out the facts: ‘There is not, I think, any doubt or dispute as to the facts and circumstances of the case. Upon the report of the Judge, who was myself, . .
Cited – Regina v Flattery 1877
The victim of the rape alleged that she had agreed to a surgical procedure which she hoped would cure her fits.
Held: Denman J said: ‘There is one case where a woman does not consent to the act of connection and yet the man may not be guilty . .
Cited – Elbekkay, Regina v CACD 12-Sep-1994
The defendant appealed against his conviction for rape. The victim had mistaken him man for her ‘boyfriend’
Held: it was rape for a man to have intercourse with a woman by impersonating her boyfriend with whom she had been living for 18 . .
Cited – Regina v Linekar CACD 21-Oct-1994
L appealed against his conviction for rape. His victim was a woman working as a prostitute. He said that he had simply made off afterwards without payment. He was convicted on the basis that he had procured the act by a false pretence by him that he . .
Cited – EB, Regina v CACD 16-Oct-2006
Appeal from conviction of rape. The appellant had not disclosed that he was HIV+ (although he did not represent that he did not have HIV).
Held: The appeal succeeded. Consent was not vitiated. . .
Cited – Assange v Swedish Prosecution Authority Admn 2-Nov-2011
The defendant argued that he should not be extradited under a European Arest warrant to Sweden to face allegations of serious sexual assaults. He argued that the prosecutor requesting the extradition was not a judicial authority, that some offences . .
Cited – F, Regina (on The Application of) v The Director of Public Prosecutions and Another Admn 24-Apr-2013
Application for judicial review of the refusal of the Director of Public Prosecutions to initiate a prosecution for rape and/or sexual assault of the claimant by her former partner. The claimant said that she had initially consented to sex with her . .
Cited – McNally v Regina CACD 27-Jun-2013
A teenage woman impersonated a teenage man and secured the consent of another young woman on that basis to engage in digital penetrative activity.
Held: A victim’s consent to a sexual penetration might be destroyed by a defendant’s deception . .
Cited – Monica, Regina (on The Application of) v Director of Public Prosecutions Admn 14-Dec-2018
Deception as to identity did not undermine consent
The claimant had been an environmental campaigner. She had had a sexual relationship with a man who was unknown to her an undercover police officer. She now challenged the decision not to prosecute him for rape.
Held: Her claim failed. Case . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.652829

The appellant had made a loan to a third party defendant in criminal fraud proceedings. At the time he did not know that that third party was subject to a restraint order under the 2002 Act. When he did come to know of the order he was asked to say it was a gift. He did. He now appealed against his conviction for interference with the course of justice, saying that he should in fact only have been guilty of contempt of court.
Held: The appeal failed. The prosecution were entitled, as a matter of law, to charge perverting the course of justice in this case, and ‘Nor so far as factual or discretionary considerations are at all relevant, do we think that it was inappropriate for perverting the course of justice to be charged here. Although this judgment has been focused on the somewhat narrow point under appeal, the context should not be overlooked; as already observed, the Appellant’s actions formed part of a carefully orchestrated and planned series of measures, designed to frustrate the intended effect of the restraint order – viz., to preserve Scragg’s assets to satisfy a confiscation order (if made). This was determined and sophisticated criminal conduct. There is a very strong public policy interest in ensuring that restraint orders are obeyed and confiscation orders enforced. Condign punishment for contempt would undoubtedly have been available; the Appellant, however, can have no legitimate complaint that the Crown did not leave matters there and instead pursued the charge of perverting the course of justice – unless prevented by law from doing so, which we have concluded it is not. ‘

Gross LJ, Burnett J, Recorder of Bristol
[2013] EWCA Crim 1, [2013] Crim LR 606, [2013] CP Rep 23, [2013] 3 All ER 85, [2013] QB 896, [2013] WLR(D) 37, [2013] 1 Cr App R 23, [2013] Lloyd’s Rep FC 213, [2013] 3 WLR 59
Bailii, WLRD
Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, Criminal Procedure Rules 2011
England and Wales
Citing:
Distinguished – Regina v Ludlam et al 11-Oct-2011
HHJ Head said: that ‘merely acting in ways which would otherwise be lawful but which constitute a breach of an Restraint Order cannot amount to the necessary ingredients of Perverting’. . .
Cited – OB v The Director of The Serious Fraud Office CACD 1-Feb-2012
The court was asked whether a breach of an order under section 41 of the 2002 Act was a civil or a criminal contempt of court. The defendant had fled to the US to avoid complying with restraint orders on being investigated for financial fraud. He . .
Cited – Regina v Vreones 1891
It was alleged that the defendant had tampered with a sample of wheat to be used in an arbitration, and he was accused of perverting the course of justice.
Held: Perverting the course of justice is a common law offence covering a wide variety . .
Cited – Regina v Clark CACD 4-Apr-2003
The defendant had been involved in a car crash. He drove his car home, and reported the accident only the following day. He appealed against a conviction for attempting to pervert the course of justice, having defeated any possibility of his being . .
Cited – Regina v Rimmington; Regina v Goldstein HL 21-Jul-2005
Common Law – Public Nuisance – Extent
The House considered the elements of the common law offence of public nuisance. One defendant faced accusations of having sent racially offensive materials to individuals. The second was accused of sending an envelope including salt to a friend as a . .
Cited – Regina v Seddon CACD 10-Mar-2009
The court considered the concept of specialty with extradition proceedings. Hughes LJ VP said: ‘Extradition is a process involving agreement between Sovereign States. The requesting State has no power to send its policemen into the requested State . .
Cited – Regina v Clipston CACD 4-Mar-2011
Confiscation proceeding are themselves broadly criminal in nature. The judge can decide issues on the balance of probabilities, compel the defendant to disclose documents, draw adverse inferences from the absence of evidence, and rely on hearsay . .
Cited – Regina v Sookoo CACD 20-Mar-2002
The defendant appealed against his sentence for attempting to pervert the course of justice and theft. He had received a sentence of six months for the theft and nine months consecutive for perverting the course of justice
Held: Allowing the . .
Cited – Regina v Abbas Hussain CACD 2012
Renewed application for leave to appeal. . .

Cited by:
Cited – The Director of Public Prosecutions v SK Admn 10-Feb-2016
The prosecutor appealed against dismissal of a charge of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. The defendant had completed somebody else’s community service sentence. The prosecutor said that such an act did affect something ‘in the course of . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.470668

Not unfair to admit statement whilst not a suspect

The defendant was in charge of a boat on the Thames. He was intoxicated as was his girlfriend. He was speeding, and allowed her to take the controls. She crashed the boat and died from her injuries. He absconded from bail, and was convicted of gross negligence manslaughter in his absence. On submitting to extradition, he now appealed saying that the court had been wrong to accept into evidence an interview he had given not under caution before he came to be suspected of an offence. The extradition warrant failed to mention the failure to surrender to bail, and he objected that he could not therefore be convicted for that offence.
Held: The appeal against the conviction for manslaughter failed. The purpose of sections 76 and 78 of the 1984 Act were clearly to be fair to those suspected of an offence. The court has clearly accepted that at the time of the interview he was not under suspicion. The defendant had charge of the boat, and was therefore responsible for the consequences of allowing a young inexperienced and drunken woman to take over.
As to the bail offence, in these particular circumstances, the proceedings against him were a nullity

Sir Brian Leveson P, Jeremy Baker, Thornton JJ
[2019] WLR(D) 344, [2019] EWCA Crim 1062
WLRD, Bailii
Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 76 78, Extradition Act 2003, Bail Act 1976 6
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Ibrahim And Others v The United Kingdom ECHR 13-Sep-2016
(Grand Chamber) The claimant objected that the court had admitted in evidence a statement taken from him not under caution by police officers already knowing that he had made other self incriminating statements, and having deliberately chosen not to . .
Cited – Regina v Seddon CACD 10-Mar-2009
The court considered the concept of specialty with extradition proceedings. Hughes LJ VP said: ‘Extradition is a process involving agreement between Sovereign States. The requesting State has no power to send its policemen into the requested State . .
Cited – Hey v Regina CACD 2010
. .
Cited – Regina v Birch CACD 2015
. .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.639265

The defendant had been convicted of misconduct in a public office and doing acts with intent to pervert the course of justice. He now appealed saying that he could demonstrate that the principal witness was dishonest. The prosecution replied that this information had been discoverable to the defence at trial.
Held: The appeal was allowed, though a retrial was ordered. Though some of the material either was or ought to have been available to the defence, some was not, and ‘we are sure that the only proper conclusion is that we cannot be satisfied that the information now available about the benefit claims, stemming from the vital fact that Sabree was dead, was known to the defendant, nor that he made a deliberate decision not to investigate it. We do not believe that it is likely that he alone elected to keep such information from his lawyers, or set unaided about the calculation of any likely riposte from the Crown.’

Hughes VP LJ, Treacy, Cranston JJ
[2011] EWCA Crim 1174
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Regina v Pendleton HL 13-Dec-2001
The defendant had appealed his conviction for murder to the Court of Appeal. The 1968 Act required the court to consider whether the conviction was unsafe. New evidence was before the Court of Appeal, but they had rejected the appeal.
Held: . .
Cited – Burridge v Regina CACD 2-Dec-2010
The defendant appealed against his conviction for the murder of his infant son. There had been considerable expert medical evidence called, but only by the prosecution.
Held: The court considered the basis upon which new evidence could be . .
Cited – Kelvin Dial (otherwise called Peter), Andrew Dottin (otherwise called Maxwell) v The State PC 14-Feb-2005
(Trinidad and Tobago) Two defendants appealed against their convictions for murder. The principal witness who had identified them, had retracted his evidence, but the retraction had not been believed. He was then shown to have lied.
Held: The . .
Cited – Stafford v Director of Public Prosecutions HL 1974
The House rejected the submission of counsel that the Court of Appeal had asked the wrong question by taking as the test the effect of the fresh evidence on their mind and not the effect that the evidence would have had on the mind of the jury. It . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Crime

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.439738