Criminal Law: Capacity Defences

What Criminal Law: Capacity Defences covers

Criminal Law: Capacity Defences is examined in Components 2 and 3, if criminal law is one of the three areas you sit. It covers insanity: the M'Naghten rules, disease of the mind and the internal cause test, the special verdict and disposal after insanity, non-insane automatism, self-induced automatism, voluntary intoxication by alcohol, intoxication by drugs and involuntary intoxication, specific and basic intent offences and drunken mistake and criticism of the capacity defences.

The 9 subtopics

Each one has its own page.

• Insanity: the M'Naghten rulesPresumption from which the M'Naghten rules begin, three elements of the M'Naghten rules and defect of reason.Open →
• Disease of the mind and the internal cause testThe legal rather than medical meaning of disease of the mind, and the internal cause line that puts arteriosclerosis, epilepsy, diabetes-caused hyperglycaemia and sleepwalking inside insanity.Open →
• The special verdict and disposal after insanityThree disposals available after a special verdict, restriction order and unfitness to plead.Open →
• Non-insane automatismAn involuntary act caused by something external, the total loss of voluntary control the courts require after Attorney-General's Reference (No 2 of 1992), and the evidential burden on the defendant.Open →
• Self-induced automatismWhere the defendant brought the state about: never a bar to a specific intent charge, but a basic intent charge turns on the Bailey question of whether the defendant was reckless in getting into that state.Open →
• Voluntary intoxication by alcoholEffect of voluntary intoxication on an offence of specific intent and dutch courage rule.Open →
• Intoxication by drugs and involuntary intoxicationHow the law splits dangerous drugs from soporific and sedative ones, Lipman and Hardie either side of that line, and why involuntary intoxication still fails if the defendant formed the mens rea anyway.Open →
• Specific and basic intent offencesOffence of specific intent, offence of basic intent and practical effect of the Majewski rule on a jury.Open →
• Drunken mistake and criticism of the capacity defencesR v O'Grady and section 76(5) of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 refusing a drunken mistake in self-defence, why Jaggard v Dickinson sits so awkwardly beside it, and the criticisms the whole area attracts.Open →

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Questions from this topic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

1. 1

   Where do the rules on insanity come from?

   Model answer

   The rules on insanity come from M'Naghten's Case (1843). The judges answered questions put to them by the House of Lords after the acquittal of Daniel M'Naghten.

2. 2

   State the presumption from which the M'Naghten rules begin.

   Model answer

   Every person is presumed sane and to possess a sufficient degree of reason to be responsible. The defence must displace that presumption.

3. 3

   State the three elements of the M'Naghten rules.

   Model answer

   The defendant must have suffered a defect of reason arising from a disease of the mind. The defect must have caused the defendant not to know the nature and quality of the act, or not to know that the act was wrong.

4. 4

   What is a defect of reason?

   Model answer

   A defect of reason is a deprivation of the power to reason. A temporary failure to use powers of reasoning is not enough.

5. 5

   Which case decided that absent-mindedness is not a defect of reason?

   Model answer

   R v Clarke [1972] held that momentary confusion or absent-mindedness is not a defect of reason. A woman with diabetes and depression who took goods from a supermarket had not lost her powers of reasoning.

6. 6

   What does not knowing the nature and quality of the act mean?

   Model answer

   The phrase covers a defendant unaware of the physical nature of what is being done. A defendant who cuts a throat believing it to be a loaf of bread does not know the nature of the act.

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Criminal Law: Capacity Defences revision questions

What does Criminal Law: Capacity Defences cover in Eduqas A-Level Law?

9 subtopics: insanity: the m'naghten rules, disease of the mind and the internal cause test, the special verdict and disposal after insanity, non-insane automatism, self-induced automatism, voluntary intoxication by alcohol, intoxication by drugs and involuntary intoxication, specific and basic intent offences and drunken mistake and criticism of the capacity defences. Each one has its own page with questions and model answers.

How is Criminal Law: Capacity Defences organised?

By the Eduqas A150QS specification, subtopic by subtopic, so it matches the order you are taught it in.