Assault
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- Created by: Ben Stephens
- Created on: 05-04-16 11:01
Force
- D does not need to apprehend the force
- the force applied need not be more serious and need be no more than the slightest touch - Savage (1992), Thomas (1985)
Savage (1992)
- Drenching of beer = battery
Thomas (1985)
- Caretaker touched hem of girl's skirt
- Obiter: touching a person's clothes while they are wearing them is equivilent to touching the person
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Indirect Force
Haystead (2000)
- D punched his girlfriend, who was holding her baby
- Girlfriend dropped baby. D convicted of battery on the baby from the injuries it suffered from being dropped
- Conviction upheld, despite there being no direct application of force onto the baby
DPP v K (1990)
- School pupil stole some acid from chemistry classroom
- Hid the acid in a toilet hand dryer when he heard someone outside the door, intending to retrieve it later
- Somebody used the dryer before D could retrieve it. V suffered burns
- Held: a battery need not be direct or even aimed at any particular victim or indeed, any victim at all.
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Unlawful Force
- the force must be unlawful - it cannot be from the ordinary jostlings of everyday life, medical situations, lawful arrests, or sporting activities, so long as any touching is within the rules of the sport
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s47 OAPA ABH
- Assault occassioning actual bodily harm (ABH) = outlined in the Offences Against the Person Act (OAPA) 1861
- AR: Causing V to apprehend immediate unlwful force, or the actual infliction of unlawful force, occassioning ABH
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Battery MR
Venna (1976)
- intention / recklessness as to the actual infliction of unlawful force
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s39 CJA Common Battery AR
- beyond assault, where D actually applies force to V
- AR: The actual infliction of unlawful force
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Introduction
- Types of assault
- Common Assault / Battery - s39 Criminal Justice Act 1988
- ABH - s47 Offences Against the Person Act 1861
- GBH - s20 OAPA 1861
- GBH - s18 OAPA 1861
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s39 CJA Common Assault AR
- s39 Criminal Justice Act 1988
- AR: D causes V to apprehend the infliction of immediate unlawful force
Read and Coker
- Servants threatened to break V's neck
- Words alone can amount to an assault
Tuberville v Savage
- Words can negate assault, if they imply that the force is not immediate, e.g. 'if'
Ireland
- D made many silent phone calls to numerous women. V suffered serious psychiatric injury
- Silence can amount to assault
Stevens v Myers
- Threatening actions can amount to an assault
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Immediate
Ireland
- V did not know where D was, so had the belief that D could get to V very quickly
Smith v Working PC
- D = looking through window and so threat could have been imminent
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Common Assault MR
Savage (1991)
- Intention/recklessness as to causing V to apprehend immediate unlawful force
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Unlawful
lawful if:
- within the regular rules of a sport
- in medicine
- lawful arrest
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What is ABH
- Considering whether D has gone beyond s39 into ABH requires considering the level of harm V suffered. This is what distinguishes it from s39
Miller (1954)
- ABH is any hurt or injury calculated to interfere with health or comfort
Chan-Fook (1994)
- V = locked in room by D
- V attempted to escape by jumping out of the window but injured self
- 'Actual' = not so trivial as to be wholly insignificant
- Psychological injury does not include mere emotions such as fear, panic, or distress
- ABH can therefore include stalking/silent phone calls - Ireland
Smith
- D cut off V's pony tail
- On appeal, ruled that cutting dead tissue did amount to ABH
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s47 MR
Roberts
- MR for ABH is the same for common assault and battery
- There is no additional MR required
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s20 OAPA GBH AR
- AR has three elements
- unlawful
- wound
- inflict grevious bodily harm
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Unlawful
- P must prove that there was no consent
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Wound
Eisenhower (1984)
- a wound is considered to be a break of both layers of skin
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Inflict GBH
DPP v Smith
- 'Grevious bodily harm' should be given the ordinary meaning of 'really serious injury'
- Confirmed in Saunders, when CA ruled there was no difference between 'serious' and 'really serious'
Brown and Stratton (1998)
- Trial judges should not attempt to give a definition to the jury
- D1 and D2 attacked D2's father for being transgender
- V suffered broken nose, three broken teeth and a cut over one eye
- Individually, these injuries would only amount to ABH
- D's conviction was upheld. CA: jury were entitled to find this harm was 'really serious'
Ireland
- Really serious psychiatrick injury = GBH
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Inflict GBH cont
Bollom (2003)
- D convicted of causing GBH with intent to a baby
- If the injuries inflicted to the baby were inflicted to an adult, it would only be ABH.
- The V's age and vulnerability can be taken into account
Dica (2004)
- D knew he had HIV
- Persuaded two women (on separate occassions) to have unprotected intercourse with him
- he did not tell them that he was HIV positive
- Both Vs contracted HIV and D was convicted of causing GBH
Martin (1881)
- D blocked the doors to a theatre, then shouted that there was a fire. People were trampled
- Held: 'inflict' = 'cause' and did not require direct force
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Inflict GBH cont
Halliday (1889)
- D frightened his wife so much that she jumped out of a window to escape and injured herself
- Conviction upheld - Following the daftnest test, V's action was a foreseeable result of D's unlawful act and he could therefore be regarded as having caused/inflicted her injuries
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s20 MR
Savage
- D got into argument in pub + threw a pint of beer over V's head
- Glass slipped from D's hand and caused cuts to V's wrist
- D charged w/s20 and appealed.
- First appeal: CA substituted s20 for s47 due to a misdirection on the MR
- Second appeal: HL upheld s47 conviction, despite not intending, or being reckless as to causing ABH
- For s20, D need only intend/be reckless to inflict SOME harm
- confirmed in Mowatt (1967)
DPP v Parmenter (1992)
- D handled baby son roughly and caused GBH
- HL said that establishing an offence under s20 requires P to prove that either D intended or that he actually foresaw that his act would casue some harm
- Unecessary to prove that D intended, or foresaw that his act might cause serious physical injury
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18 OAPA GBH
- s18 GBH with intent is indictable
- most serious assault
AR (same as s20)
- Unlawful
- Wound
- Caused GBH
MR
- P must prove intention
- Intent must be either
- to cause GBH
- OR
- to resist or avoid arrest
- to cause GBH
- Intention to merely wound will not suffice - Taylor (2009)
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