Intoxication, Rape and Secondary Liability: In What Circumstances Is a ‘Sheehan Direction’ Necessary When Determining the Liability of an Intoxicated Secondary Party?: R v Mohamadi [2020] EWCA Crim 327
| Author | Tony Storey |
| Published date | 01 August 2020 |
| Date | 01 August 2020 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/0022018320951285 |
| Subject Matter | Case Notes |
Case Note
Intoxication, Rape and
Secondary Liability: In What
Circumstances Is a ‘Sheehan
Direction’ Necessary When
Determining the Liability of
an Intoxicated Secondary
Party?
R v Mohamadi [2020] EWCA Crim 327
Keywords
Rape, secondary liability, intoxication, Sheehan direction
In September 2016, at around 3.30 in the morning, Rafiullah Hamidy (H), Hamid Mohamadi (M), Tamin
Rahmani (R) and Shershah Muslimyar (S) were driving home from a nightclub in Ramsgate, Kent. R
dropped the others off near his flat above a pizza and kebab takeaway on Margate Road and went to park.
At the same time, a 16-year-old girl, E, was walking along Margate Road, alone. She had been out for the
night with friends but had separated from them and was trying to find a friend’s house where she planned
to spend the rest of the night. She was ‘ver y drunk’ as well as lost. She spotted H, M and S and
approached them to ask for directions to her friend’s house. However, instead of helping her, they took
her back to R’s flat. There, she was stripped and raped both orally and vaginally on a mattress on the
floor. One man also raped her anally. Afterwards, she got dressed and left the building. She was found by
a couple returning home who called the police. M, R and S were arrested soon after. H, who had fled to
Italy, was extradited back to the UK.
All four men were charged with rape. They appeared before HHJ Norton and a jury at Canterbury
Crown Court in May 2017. H, R and S were convicted of rape after DNA evidence in the form of their
semen was found on E’s body and clothing, and on the mattress, which linked them to the offences.
(Only H admitted having sex with E, which he claimed was consensual.) No such evidence linked M to
the rape. Indeed, he denied having sex with E or even being present in the room. He claimed that he had
been ‘very drunk’ on the night in question and, although he admitted being in the flat, said that he had
fallen asleep in another room. However, he too was convicted after HHJ Norton directed the jury to
convict if sure that he had intentionally penetrated E or, if not, that he had intentionally assisted the
others to do so.
At one point during the trial, M had requested that the trial judge direct the jury on the significance of
his intoxication. However, HHJ Norton had declined to do so because M’s defence was that he was
neither a participant in the rape nor an accessory to it; therefore, she said, any direction about M’s
intoxication would be addressing an ‘e ntirely hypothetical’ situation wh ich had not been raised in
evidence.
The Journal of Criminal Law
2020, Vol. 84(4) 380–384
ªThe Author(s) 2020
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DOI: 10.1177/0022018320951285
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