Court of Criminal Appeal
| DOI | 10.1177/002201836002400105 |
| Published date | 01 January 1960 |
| Date | 01 January 1960 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Court of
Criminal
Appeal
MEANING
OF
DIMINISHED
RESPONSIBILITY ON MURDER CHARGE
R. v. Walden
A
PERSON
is
not
to be convicted of
murder
if he was
suffering from such abnormality
of
mind as substantially
impaired his mental responsibility.
The
abnormality of
mind
thus
referred to in s. 2(I) of
the
Homicide Act, 1957,
may arise, so
the
section states, from acondition of arrested
or retarded development of
mind
or any inherent cause or be
induced by disease or injury.
In
the
case of R. v. Spriggs
(1958 IQ.B. 270) the
judge
prepared and handed to
the
jury
the
terms of the section without attempting to explain further
what
the
section meant
and
the
Court
of Criminal Appeal
rejected the contention
that
there was a duty on
the
judge
to
define or redefine "abnormality of
mind"
or
"mental
responsi-
bility".
It
has now been ruled in
R.
v. Walden (1959, I
W.L.R. 1008)
that
R. v. Spriggs did
not
decide
that
the
judge
was
not
entitled, in order to assist
the
jury
upon
the
facts of
the
case before them, to point
out
by way of illustration or
explanation
the
sort of thing which they could look for to see
if
the
case came within the section.
The
trial
judge
in R. v.
Walden had handed to
the
jury
a copy of the section
but
he
had also given
them
some explanation of it.
The
Court
(Hilbery, Havers
and
Hinchcliffe, n.), in dismissing
the
appeal against aconviction of capital murder, held
that
there
had been no misdirection of the
jury
and
that
he had acted
properly in this respect.
The
appellant, alecturer at a technical college, had
proposed marriage to a girl employed in the college office,
but
she declined the proposal and favoured astudent of
the
same
age as herself. A week or so after
the
proposal the appellant
saw
the
student talking to
the
girl through awindow.
The
appellant returned, shot the student through
the
back
and
then
went into
the
office and shot the girl through
the
back
six times,
the
last three shots being fired into
her
as she lay on
31
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