R v Le Brun
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judgment Date | 19 July 1991 |
| Date | 19 July 1991 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) |
Crime - Homicide - Manslaughter - Unlawful assault without intention to do victim really serious harm - Attempt to conceal commission of assault by moving victim - Death resulting from injury sustained by victim while being moved - Whether break in chain linking unlawful assault with death - Whether coincidence of act causing death with mens rea necessary to constitute manslaughter
The appellant had an argument with his wife in the street outside their house, during the course of which struck her unlawfully without intending to do her really serious harm and she fell unconscious on the highway. He then moved her, whereupon her head hit the pavement with the result that her skull was fractured causing her death. The appellant was tried on a count of murder. The jury were directed that, depending on their finding of the appellant's intention when he had first struck her, they could convict of murder or manslaughter if they were sure that he had accidentally dropped her, causing her death, while attempting to move her in order either to get her into the house against her will or to cover up the previous assault. The jury acquitted him of murder and convicted him of manslaughter.
On appeal against conviction: —
Held, dismissing the appeal, that where the unlawful application of force and the eventual act causing death were part of the same sequence of events, the fact that there was an appreciable time interval between the two events did not serve to exonerate the appellant from liability, particularly where his subsequent actions, which caused the death after the initial unlawful blow, were designed to conceal his commission of the unlawful assault; that the appellant's action in moving the victim with the intention of evading liability did not break the chain linking the initial blow with the death; that, in the circumstances, the act which caused death and the necessary mental state to constitute manslaughter did not need to coincide in point of time; and that the judge's direction, read against the background of fact and viewed as a whole, was satisfactory in relation to manslaughter and the appeal failed (post, pp. 659D–G, 662F–G).
The following cases are referred to in the judgment:
Meli v. The Queen [
Reg. v. Church [
Reg. v. Moore [
No additional cases were cited in argument.
APPEAL against conviction
The appellant, John Le Brun, on 31 March 1990 in the Crown Court at Plymouth, before Hutchison J. and a jury, was found not guilty of murder and was convicted by a majority of 11 to 1 of manslaughter. He was sentenced to four years' imprisonment.
He appealed on the grounds that the judge had erred in law in (1) rejecting a defence submission at the close of the case for the prosecution, in that an innocent explanation for the victim's death — namely, being accidentally dropped by the appellant as he attempted to move her — could not reasonably be excluded on the evidence for the prosecution, since none of the other injuries allegedly caused by the appellant before that dropping could have caused death; (2) failing to direct the jury that they could not convict of murder or manslaughter simply on the basis of any assault by the appellant on the victim before dropping her: the jury should have been directed that they could not be sure that such an assault had caused death; and (3) directing the jury that they could convict the appellant of murder or manslaughter (depending on the intention with which he had previously assaulted the victim) if they were sure that, having committed the assault with no serious injury resulting, he had accidentally dropped the victim, causing her death, while either: (a) attempting to move her to her home against her wishes, including any wishes she might have expressed before the previous assault, and/or (b) attempting to dispose of her body or otherwise cover up the previous assault.
The facts are stated in the judgment.
Christopher Wilson-Smith Q.C. and Andrew Spink (assigned by the Registrar of Criminal Appeals) for the appellant.
Rosina Hare Q.C. and Nigel Seed for the Crown.
LORD LANE C.J. gave the following judgment of the court. On 31 March 1990 in the Crown Court at Plymouth before Hutchison J. and a jury, this appellant, John Le Brun, was convicted on a majority verdict of manslaughter. He was found not guilty of murder with which he had originally been charged. He was sentenced to four years' imprisonment. He now appeals against conviction by leave of the single judge.
The facts giving rise to the charge were these. In September 1989 the appellant, who was then serving in the Royal Navy, was living at an address in Plymouth with his wife, who was the victim in the present case. They went out for the evening to some friends, the Cartwrights, on 23 September 1989. They left the house of the friends, in the early hours at about 2 a.m. They did not have very far to go to their own home. They had been drinking. They were both described as merry, but neither, it was said, was drunk.
It was only two or three minutes walk to get to their own home. But during that short journey it is quite plain that a heated argument developed between the two of them. To come to the end of the story, after a short interval, which was really only sufficient for the friends whose house they had visited to have tidied up the house, taken the dog for a walk and prepared for bed, the appellant returned to the Cartwrights, banged on the door and shouted “It's Joannie … she's collapsed. There's blood everywhere. Get an ambulance.”
In fact the wife (as I shall call her now) was lying near the top of some steps leading from the pathway to their home. She had sustained two wounds to her head: a fracture to the back of the skull and a severe injury to her chin which had produced what might described as a star shaped wound. That wound had broken the jaw and caused bleeding into the joints on each side. She had sustained also a bruise on the outer edge of the lip on the left, a fracture to both wings of the hyoid bone at the top of the neck. As can be seen from the photographs, there was a good deal of blood at the scene and — a matter of some importance — some hair which had plainly been pulled by the roots out of her scalp was lying at the scene. The cause of death was bruising to the brain which in its turn had been caused by the fracture to the back of the skull.
There was abundant evidence from the neighbours of the argument which had taken place between these two. For example Mrs. Luke, whose house overlooked the area where the incident took place, heard a man sounding very angry and aggressive, plainly wanting a woman (the wife in this case) to go into the house. Indeed it is plain from her evidence and from the evidence of other eye witnesses or other witnesses who heard what was going on, that one reason for the altercation between these two was the woman's wish not to go into the house and the man's wish that she should.
Mrs. Luke saw two people arguing. Eventually she heard a thump and a moan and saw the woman kneeling against the metal railing and the man taking hold of her with a hand on her head. She next saw the woman lying on the ground, the man telling her to get up and then pulling her by the arms or shoulders towards the road. It then seemed to her that he let go of her. So she fell and her head hit the...
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