Murder

Lord Coke- 'the unlawful killing of a reasonable creature in being under the Queen's Peace, with malice aforethought expressed or implied'

Foetus is not a human being- AGR#3

Can't be brain dead- Malcherek

The definition is not met if self defence is used- Martin

Factual- 'but for'- White

Legal- unbroken chain of causation

'operating and substancial'- Paggett

'more than minimal'- Kato

'slight and triffling'- Kimsey

Possible breaks in the chain:

Victim's own act must be reasonable foreseeable- Williams

Acts of a 3rd party, medical negligence must be 'so independent' from that of the original wound as to make it 'insignificant'- Cheshire... Smith

Natural but unpredictable event can break the chain

Thin Skull Rule- Blaue

'malice aforethought expressed or implied'

Expressed- Direct intent to kill ('main aim or purpose'- Mohan)

Implied- Intention to cause GBH ('serious harm'- DPP v Smith), intention to cause GBH amounts to intention to kill- Vickers, confirmed in Cunningham

Oblique Intent- Where D's main was not to kill but in achieving aim death or serious injury was caused. D does not have MR unless he had 'foresight of consequences'

Foresight of consequences- Leading case- Woolin (confirmed by Matthews and Alleyne), gave 2 part test: Was the consequence VC? Did D know? If jury find that D foresaw the VC of death or serious injury, they are entitled to find intention but do not have to

This is the principle that D can be guilty if he intended to commit a similar crime against a different V

Latimer- Belt

Mitchell- push in post office

However, where MR is for different offence, D may not be guilty

Pembliton- threw stone

The general rule is that AR and MR must be present at the same time for there to be an offence- including for murder, however complications arise where it is uncertain if the two were both present

Thabo Meli- Ds attacked man and pushed him off cliff after thinking they had killed him, when he actually died afterwards. Tried to argue that these were two seperate acts, in which the AR and MR were seperated. Privy Council held that 2 parts of Ds plan could not be divided up this way. Both acts were part of plan to murder and if they had MR for murder at any point during those acts, they were guilty of murder