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Criminal Law - Causation
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Comprehensive notes on Criminal Law in the UK, on causation.
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CRIMINAL LAWREVISION NOTES
INTRODUCTION:
WHAT IS CAUSATION?
CAUSATION: whether the accused’s criminal act/ omission caused the
prohibited result.
This means that the prosecution must show a link between a particular
wrongful act by the accused and a criminal harm, in order for the
accused to be held liable for the result.
CHAIN OF CAUSATION: a metaphor to describe the continuous link between
the act and the result.
Causation allows us to attribute accountability for the occurrence of a
social harm.
EXAMPLE:
A delivers a lethal dose of poison to B in the form of chocolate. B eats the
chocolate but before the poison has time to work, B is shot dead by C.
The cause of death, in this scenario, is C’s shot. There is no causal
link between A’s poison and B’s death.
IS CAUSATION A REQUISITE ELEMENT FOR ALL CRIMES?
All crimes can be divided into two groups: conduct crimes and result
crimes.
1. CONDUCT CRIMES: crimes whose actus reus consists simply of the
violation of some norm of conduct. This criminal conduct is what is
criminalised.
2. RESULT CRIMES: crimes whose actus reus consists of bringing about
some harmful consequence that society wishes to avoid. The result in
the actus reus is what is criminalised.
For result crimes, criminal liability depends upon proof of an act/
omission (actus reus) performed with the requisite mental attitude
(mens rea) which is causally connected to the relevant harmful
consequence (causation).
Therefore, only result crimes require proof of causation.
EXAMPLES:
To charge a defendant under section 18 OAPA (causing GBH with intent) or
under section 20 OAPA (maliciously inflicting GBH): the accused’s act
must have caused the GBH.
To charge a defendant for crimes of homicide, i.e. murder or manslaughter:
the accused’s act/ omission must have caused the death of the victim.
, CRIMINAL LAW
REVISION NOTES
To charge a defendant for a crime of assault: the accused must have
caused undesired contact/ caused the victim to apprehend undesired
contact.
THE STATUTE:
The common law position of causation can be found in clause 17 of the
Draft Criminal Code Bill: (1989).
In essence, it states that to be accountable: the defendant’s acts/
omissions must have contributed to the coming about of the relevant
harmful result; and nothing abnormal should have subsequently
occurred so as to break this link between the act and the result.
⇩
FRAMEWORK FOR CAUSATION:
To be the cause of a criminal harm, two conditions must be satisfied:
1. The defendant’s wrongful act must be the FACTUAL CAUSE of the harm: the
defendant’s act/ omission must result in the harmful consequence.
2. The defendant’s wrongful act must be the LEGAL CAUSE of the harm: it is
fair/ appropriate to attribute that harm to the defendant’s wrongful
act and for them to bear responsibility for it.
! If the defendant is not a factual cause of a criminal harm, they cannot be the legal
cause.
1. FACTUAL CAUSATION:
A. THE BUT-FOR TEST: the ‘but-for’ test is used to determine
whether or not an action is the factual cause of the harm.
BUT-FOR TEST: to be a factual cause, the prosecution must show that ‘but
for’ the defendant’s wrongful act, the harmful result would not have
occurred.
If the result would not have occurred without the defendant’s act,
then factual causation will generally be established. If the result would
have occurred regardless of the defendant’s act, the prosecution will
fail.
R v White: this is the authority for the use of the but-for test. The defendant
poisoned his mother’s drink, because he wanted to receive his inheritance early.
Before the poison could set in, the mother died of a heart attack. The son was
charged with murder due to the presence of the actus reus (the defendant’s
poisoning of the drink), the mens rea (the defendant’s intent to kill her to retrieve his
inheritance early) and a harmful result (the mother’s death). However, he was not
guilty because the mother died due to the heart attack and not the
poisoning. Her death would have occurred, even if he had not poisoned
her. The failure of the but-for test meant that no factual causation was established.
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