The appellant said he become involved in drug dealing and become indebted to his supplier, X, who had given him a gun and told him to obtain the money from a bank or building society the following day, failing which he would be killed. The appellant accordingly committed the robbery of which he was convicted. In directing the jury on the defence of duress advanced by the defendant the trial judge had said: ‘The final question is this: did he, in obtaining heroin from Mr X and supplying it to others for gain, after he knew of Mr X’s reputation for violence, voluntarily put himself in a position where he knew that he was likely to be forced by Mr X to commit a crime?’ It was argued by the appellant that the judge should have said ‘forced by Mr X to commit armed robbery’, but this was rejected, and the court held that by ‘a crime’ the jury could only have understood the judge to be referring to a crime other than drug dealing.
Held: The principle was this: ‘The crux of the matter, as it seems to us, is knowledge in the defendant of either a violent nature to the gang or the enterprise which he has joined, or a violent disposition in the person or persons involved with him in the criminal activity he voluntarily joined. In our judgment, if a defendant voluntarily participates in criminal offences with a man ‘X’, whom he knows to be of a violent disposition and likely to require him to perform other criminal acts, he cannot rely upon duress if ‘X’ does so.’
Judges:
Lord Taylor of Gosforth CJ, Alliott and Rix JJ
Citations:
[1995] Crim LR 303 (Comment), Unreported, 14 November 1994
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Hasan, Regina v HL 17-Mar-2005
The House was asked two questions: the meaning of ‘confession’ for the purposes of section 76(1) of the 1984 Act, and as to the defence of duress. The defendant had been involved in burglary, being told his family would be harmed if he refused. The . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Crime
Updated: 06 May 2022; Ref: scu.223670
