Manslaughter and Dangerous Driving
| Date | 01 August 1992 |
| Published date | 01 August 1992 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002201839205600310 |
| Author | Glanville Williams |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Journal
of
Criminal
Law
MANSLAUGHTER
AND
DANGEROUS
DRIVING
Glanville Williams*
The Road Traffic Act 1991 rewords the two offences of reckless driving in
ss 1 and 2 of the 1988 Act so that they are now offences of dangerous
driving (which in effect they have long been). The change of wording is
an improvement, but there remains the anomaly that the s 1 offence, as a
matter of definition, is in effect manslaughter under adifferent name.
Before the Road Traffic Act 1991 the most serious statutory offences of
bad driving were called 'reckless driving', but the meaning of recklessness
had been so watered down by interpretation as to become misleading. The
reworded provisions make the welcome change of allowing us to call the
offences 'dangerous driving', defined to make it clear that the test is
objective: the driving must (to put it briefly) be such that it would be
obvious to a competent and careful driver that such driving falls far below
what is to be expected. This definition does little more than make explicit
the interpretation thatthe courts had formerly attached to the inappropriate
word 'reckless'; so very little change of substance is involved. But the Act
of 1991, being a Road Traffic Act, does not deal with the common law
crime of manslaughter, and thus sheds no light on the relation of causing
death by dangerous driving to manslaughter.
The
statutory offence carries a maximum of five years' imprisonment,
which may not be regarded as enough for a particularly heinous case (the
worst of all being one where the defendant deliberately drove at a group
of people, killing some of them). Here the prosecutor may wish to charge
manslaughter. Sometimes, to guard against failure of the manslaughter
charge, he may wish to add a count for dangerous driving. Can he do so?
If
he does not, can the jury nevertheless convict of causing death by
dangerous driving as a lesser offence?
If
the jury are allowed to choose
between manslaughter and causing death by dangerous driving, how is the
judge to explain the difference to them?
If
the law were rational, the answer to these questions would be simple.
Of
course (it may be thought) the indictment can combine a charge of
manslaughter with some lesser charge if it arises out of the same facts.
(Even murder can be conjoined with another offence nowadays.)
And
of
course the jury should be able to convict of the lesser offence if they acquit
of manslaughter. As to directing the jury, the judge should have no
problem. Manslaughter should require subjective recklessness, while
causing death by dangerous driving can be committed by gross negligence
without amental element.
• QC, Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge.
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