British Cases Legal Importance Term paper
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The three cases chosen are R. v. Moloney (1985), Airedale National Health Service Trust v. Bland (1993) and R. v. R. (1991). Taking each case separately, endeavours will be made to show in what way they are significant in legal terms, also in social or cultural terms, where apposite. It shall be stated whether each is a public or private matter, public concerns relating here to serious crimes, private concerns to torts, and the consequence, remarked upon. Intention, forethought, recklessness, and murder will be considered around R. v. Moloney (1985), whether an act or omission has taken place, consent, and euthanasia, around Airedale National Health Service Trust v. Bland (1993) and in the case of R. v. R. (1991), marital rape and the conjugal rights of men and women. For a defendant to be found guilty of a crime, both the actus reus and the mens rea for the offence should be present. Both terms have very specific meanings, that may alter dependant upon the offence committed, but in general, the actus reus is the guilty act or acts of the person committing the wrongdoing, that is, all the aspects of a offence except for the state of mind and the mens rea, the mentality of the lawbreaking person, which encompasses intention, knowledge, recklessness and negligence, or any combination of these. Considering the mens rea of intention and recklessness, R. v. Moloney (1985) seems to be an important case.
A soldier, Moloney, on leave, was staying with his mother and stepfather. He had, it appears, a very good relationship with his stepfather. A dinner party was held, after which Moloney and his stepfather, being the worse for drink, the court was told, decided upon a contest to find out which of them could load and fire his gun the fastest. The father was said to have taunted Moloney to shoot him. Moloney did just that, and shot him dead, from about six feet. In evidence, Moloney said I never conceived that what I was doing might cause injury to anybody. It was just a lark. (Criminal Law, Third Edition, Elliot and Quinn, Pearson Education Limited, Longman, p.47). It seems that Moloney did not want to kill his stepfather, but did he have the intention to kill him?
It should be a foreseeable fact for any reasonable person, that to point a loaded live weapon at another, and shoot, would be likely to cause death or grievous bodily harm. It is significant to note, that malice aforethought, the definition of the mens rea for murder, has come to denote the intention to either kill, or cause grievous bodily harm. In the words of Lord Bridge, in reference to Moloney, Whatever his state of mind, the appellant was undoubtedly guilty of a high degree of recklessness. But, so far as I know, no one has yet suggested that recklessness can furnish the necessary element in the crime of murder. ( A Level Law: Cases and Materials, Third Edition, Hogan, Seago and Bennett, Concise College Texts, Sweet and Maxwell, p. 303), intention, therefore had to be established He also indicated that even when a result was not desired, it was relatively feasible for it to be intended. The opinions established in Hyam v. D.P.P. (1975), in which it seemed foresight was intention, so was satisfactory mens rea for murder, were altered in R. v. Moloney (1985). The House of Lords considered the findings made in Hyam to have been wrongly determined and now deemed foresight, not as intent, but only evidence from which intent could be found and that malice aforethought comprise of as a minimum, the intention to kill or cause grievous bodily harm. The mens rea for murder was thus defined very differently by the House of Lords in the Moloney (1985) case compared to the earlier decision in Hyam (1975). Moloney appeared to have had the intention to shoot the gun, although he did not want to kill or injure his stepfather, he should have foreseen that firing the gun could have caused harm. This case therefore established that if the results of an act can be foreseen, a person can have intention even when they do not want the corollary, this is identified as oblique intent. R. v. Moloney (1985) was as a result, an important case where attempts to specify decisions, to the degree of foresight needed to provide evidence, were made. This case is a criminal public matter, as it was associated with the serious crime of murder, although perhaps not everyone might have thought it so, due to the circumstances in which the act was committed. It did lead however to a prosecution for murder, although later the House of Lords replaced this with a manslaughter verdict, on appeal. The following case looks at the crime of rape within marriage.
The case of R. v. R. (1991) was the first case where marital rape was actually accepted as a crime, by the courts. A husband living apart from his wife forced his way in to the house where she was living, and had sex with her, without her consent. He was convicted of rape. Up until this point, rape within marriage was considered to be lawful , as a woman, by accepting marriage, consequentially gave consent to sexual intercourse for the duration of the marriage, to her husband and she could not rescind on it. Women were historically considered the property of their husband; raping another mans wife was a property offence, and so it was seen as reasonable for a man to force his wife to have sex with him. The case of R. v. R. (1991) rightly changed the attitudes within law, concerning the rights of women within marriage. Lord Keith said, This is not the creation of a new offence, it is the removal of a common law fiction which has become anachronistic and offensive, and we consider it our duty having reached that conclusion to act upon it. (St Brendan s Sixth Form College, A Level Law notes: Law and morals, compiled by John Deft, http://www.stbrn.ac.uk/other/depts/law/). The new law could be seen as a beneficial achievement nationally, for the rights of women, and their protection, and was generally applauded. The Criminal Justice and Public Order Act (1994) amended the Sexual Offences Act (1956) and reinforced the law on the offence, decided in R. v. R. (1991), of marital rape. Apparently though, there are those who seemingly have trouble coming to terms with the amendment; if within a marriage a situation could be dealt with quickly, avoiding bitter feelings from the children towards their mother, it would probably be best to keep the conjugal exclusion for rape, rather than the law intervening. This was noted in the fifteenth report of the Criminal Law Revision Committee, though it should be observed, doubtless not a view held by all. It should be mentioned that as modern day society regards rape within marriage as morally unacceptable, for the most part opinions seem to have altered. Marital rape as an offence,...
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