In the English law of homicide, manslaughter is a less serious offence than murder, the differential being between levels of fault based on the mens rea (Latin for "guilty mind") or by reason of a partial defence. In England and Wales, a common practice is to prefer a charge of murder, with the judge or defence able to introduce manslaughter as an option (see alternative verdict). The jury then decides whether the defendant is guilty or not guilty of either murder or manslaughter. On conviction for manslaughter, sentencing is at the judge's discretion, whereas a sentence of life imprisonment is mandatory on conviction for murder. Manslaughter may be either voluntary or involuntary, depending on whether the accused has the required mens rea for murder.
Voluntary manslaughter Voluntary manslaughter occurs when the defendant kills with mens rea (an intention to kill or cause grievous bodily harm), but one of those partial defences which reduce murder to manslaughter applies (these consist of mitigating circumstances which reduce the defendant's culpability). The original mitigating factors were provocation and chance medley which existed at common law, but the former has been abolished by statute, the latter has been held no longer to existR v Semini 1 KB 405, 33 Cr App R 51, CCA and new defences have been created by statute.
The Homicide Act 1957 now provides two defences which may be raised to allow the court to find the accused guilty of voluntary manslaughter: diminished responsibility and suicide pact. The Coroners and Justice Act 2009 creates the defence of "loss of control".
Diminished responsibility
Under section 2 of the Homicide Act 1957 there are three requirements for the defendant to raise the defence of diminished responsibility. The defendant must have suffered from an abnormality of mind at the time of the killing caused by one of the causes specified by the Act which substantially impaired the defendant's mental responsibility for the killing. Under section 2(2) of the Act it is for the defendant to prove he suffered from such a condition on the balance of probabilities.
Abnormality of mind
An abnormality of mind has been defined by Lord Parker CJ "as state of mind so different from that of ordinary human beings that the reasonable man would term it abnormal".R v Byrne 2 QB 396 In deciding whether this state of mind exists the jury should consider medical evidence, but also all other evidence including acts and statements of the accused and his demeanour. The jury does not have to accept the medical evidence if other material conflicts with and outweighs it.
Specified causes
The Homicide Act specifies three causes one of which must cause the abnormality; they are a condition of arrested or retarded development of mind, any inherent cause or a disease or injury. Whether the abnormality is caused by one of the specified causes is a matter for medical evidence alone. Alcoholism is capable of being an abnormality of mind even if there is no physical damage to the brain.R v Wood 1 W.L.R. 496
Substantial impairment of mental responsibility
Whether the abnormality substantially impaired the defendant's mental responsibility for the killing is a question of degree for the jury. In R v Lloyd the Court of Appeal held that the lack of control must simply be ‘more than trivial’. 1 Q.B. 175 at 177
Premenstrual tension (PMT) has been accepted as a mitigating factor in several high-profile cases. In 1980, Sandie Smith was convicted of manslaughter for stabbing a barmaid. Dr. Katharina Dalton who examined Smith before the trial diagnosed her with severe PMS. This diagnosis was accepted as a cause of diminished responsibility. Smith was sentenced to three years probation despite previous convictions for violent behaviour.
Loss of control
Loss of control is a partial defence to murder introduced by the Coroners and Justice Act 2009. It replaced the previous defence of provocation.
Suicide pacts Section 4(1) of the Homicide Act 1957 introduced the defence of suicide pact. Parliament's intention was to show some compassion for those who had been involved in a suicide pact but failed to die. Section 4(3) defines a suicide pact as "a common agreement between two or more persons having for its object the death of all of them, whether or not each is to take his own life". Further the accused must have had a "settled intention of dying in pursuance of the pact" to avoid the accused entering into a supposed pact with the real intention of committing murder. The Law Commission has proposed abolishing the defence with deserving cases falling within diminished responsibility,Law Commission Consultation Paper No. 177, A New Homicide Act for England and Wales but feels it should be retained pending a review of a new partial defence of mercy killings.Law Commission Report No. 304, Murder, Manslaughter and Infanticide
Involuntary manslaughter
Involuntary manslaughter arises where the accused did not intend to cause death or serious injury but caused the death of another through recklessness or criminal negligence. For these purposes, recklessness is defined as a blatant disregard for the dangers of a particular situation. An example of this would be dropping a brick off a bridge, landing on a person's head, killing them. Assuming there is no intention to cause really serious harm, murder does not arise. But the act of dropping the brick is itself criminal, and where a criminal and dangerous act causes death, that will (generally) constitute manslaughter. This form of manslaughter is also termed "unlawful act" or "constructive" manslaughter.
Manslaughter by gross negligence Under English law, where a person owes a duty of care (either by statute or by the neighbour principleDonoghue v Stevenson AC 562) and is negligent to such a degree that consequently the law regards it as a crimeR v Evans EWCA Crim 650 (namely the person has been grossly negligent) and that person causes the victim to die, they may be liable for gross negligence manslaughter.R v Adomako 1 AC 171 The defendants in such cases are often people carrying out jobs that require special skills or care, such as doctors, teachers, police or prison officers, or electricians, who fail to meet the standard which could be expected from a reasonable person of the same profession.Attorney General's Reference (No. 2 of 1999) 3 AER 182. This was a reference to the Court of Appeal for an opinion on a point of law arising from a criminal acquittal, a quasi-appeal procedure created by section 36(1) of the Criminal Justice Act 1972. In R v BatemanR v Bateman (1925) 19 Cr App R 8, (1925) ? Cox 33, All ER Rep 45, CCA. For an explanation of these abbreviations see Case citation. the Court of Criminal Appeal held that gross negligence manslaughter involved the following elements: the defendant owed a duty to the deceased to take care; the defendant breached this duty; the breach caused the death of the deceased; and the defendant's negligence was gross, that is, it showed such a disregard for the life and safety of others as to amount to a crime and deserve punishment.
The House of Lords in SeymourR v Seymour 2 AC 493, 3 WLR 349, 2 All ER 1058, 77 Cr App R 215, RTR 455, Crim LR 742, HL, affirming 76 Cr App R 211, CA sought to identify the mens rea for "motor manslaughter" (negligently causing death when driving a motor vehicle). Reference was made to R v Caldwell and R v LawrenceR v Caldwell AC 341, HLR v Lawrence AC 510, 2 WLR 524, 73 Cr App R 1, 1 All ER 974, RTR 217, Crim LR 409, HL, reversing 71 Cr App R 291 which held that a person was reckless if: he did an act which in fact created an obvious and serious risk of injury to the person or substantial damage to property; and when he did the act he either had not given any thought to the possibility of there being any such risk or had recognised that there was some risk involved and had nonetheless gone on to do it.
The conclusion was that for motor manslaughter (and, by implication, for all cases of gross negligence), it was more appropriate to adopt this definition of recklessness. Consequently, if the defendant created an obvious and serious risk of causing physical injury to someone, there could be liability whether there was simple inadvertence or conscious risk-taking. It was no longer a defence to argue that the negligence had not been gross. (The specific offence of motor manslaughter has largely been replaced by statutory offences of causing death by driving in the Road Traffic Act 1988.)
In R v AdomakoR v Adomako 1 AC 171, 3 WLR 288, 3 All ER 79, 99 Cr App R 362, HL an anaesthetist failed to notice that a tube had become disconnected from the ventilator and the patient died. Lord Mackay disapproved Seymour and held that the Bateman test of gross negligence was the appropriate test in manslaughter cases involving a breach of duty, allowing the jury to consider the accused's conduct in all the surrounding circumstances, and to convict only if the negligence was very serious. Individuals have a duty to act in the following situations: to care for certain defined classes of helpless relatives, e.g. spouses must take care of each other, and parents must look after their dependent children. In R v Stone and DobinsonR v Stone and Dobinson QB 354, 64 Cr App R 186, 2 WLR 169, 2 All ER 341, Crim LR 166, CA an elderly woman with anorexia nervosa came to stay with her brother and his cohabitee, who were both of low intelligence, and subsequently starved herself to death. The Court of Appeal held that the question whether the couple owed a duty to care for the deceased was a question of fact for the jury, which was entitled to take into account the facts that she was a relative of one of the appellants, that she was occupying a room in his house, and that the other appellant had undertaken the duty to care for her by trying to wash her and taking food to her. where there is a contract (even if the person injured was outside the contractual relationship and, in the civil law would be barred by privity from enforcing the contract). In R v Pittwood,R v Pittwood 1902 TLR 37 a railway crossing gatekeeper had opened the gate to let a cart pass and forgot to shut it again. Later a hay cart was struck by a train while crossing. He was convicted of manslaughter. It was argued on his behalf that he owed a duty only to his employers, the railway company, with whom he had contracted. Wright J, held, however, that the man was paid to keep the gate shut and protect the public so had a duty to act. In contracts relating both to employment and to the provision of services, R v YaqoobR v Yaqoob 2005 EWCA Crim 1269 considered a partner in a taxi firm who was responsible for making all necessary arrangements for the inspection and maintenance of a minibus which had overturned after its tyre burst, killing one of its passengers. He was convicted of manslaughter because the failure properly to maintain the minibus was the direct cause of the accident and there was an implied duty owed both to other members of the partnership and to those renting the vehicle, to inspect and maintain beyond the standard required for a MOT test, council inspections, and other duties imposed by regulation. The jury was competent to assess whether the failure to discharge that implied duty was gross negligence without hearing any expert evidence; these were not technical issues and they did not need expert help. The sentence of four years imprisonment was within the sentencing band and not excessive.
In Attorney-General's Reference (No 2 of 1999), a case on corporate manslaughter that arose out of the Southall rail crash, the Court of Appeal decided the defendant's subjective state of mind (i.e. whether there was conscious risk-taking) is irrelevant and, therefore, so is the question of recklessness, leaving the objective test as the only test for liability. Rose LJ said: