The "Actus Reus" of a crime. Causation and Consequences

If you are charged with a crime, having a basic understanding of how the prosecution thinks, what they are looking to prove and ultimately what they need to get you convicted, can help you put into perspective your current situation and also help guide you along this journey. In this post we will analyze what we consider a few terms.

1. The difference between a "factual cause" and a "legal Cause"
2. Conduct crimes and Result crimes
3. Intervening events. 

Conduct and Result Crimes. 

A conduct crime is an "actus reus/wrongful act" which does not require proof of harm. For e.g. when someone ignores a red light, they have not yet cause any harm, but have committed a criminal offence. Theft, perjury and possession of drugs and firearms.

Result crimes are crimes whose actus reus" (wrongful act) results in some form of harm coupled with a wrong conduct. Criminal Damage, ABH (Assault occasioning bodily harm), and murder are examples of result crimes. 

Your conduct or omission is considered to be the factual cause of the result if the result of your act or omission would not have occurred "but for" your behavior or lack thereof.

Let's look at an example taken from the study University of London Study Guide. 

D, as a joke, places a wet bar of soap on the floor of V’s bathroom, hoping that V will slip on the soap. V does slip on the soap, hits her head on the floor and is knocked unconscious. Does D cause V’s injury? 

This sounds like a Section 47 OAPA offence Assault Occasioning Bodily harm. If D was charged with a section 47 offence He would need to prove that he did not intentionally or recklessly cause Vs injury, however as you can probably deduce, would V have suffered his injuries had the soap not been intentionally placed there by the defendant? The defendant might want to argue that he did not intend to cause her to hit her head and faint but only intended for her to step on the soap. the prosecution might suggest however that falling, and also possibly injuring was reasonably foreseeable and thus d should be held liable for Vs injuries. 

In the above example D is thus the factual cause since the V would most probably not fallen and hit her head had the bar of soap not been placed there. 

Lets alter the example as in teh study guide 

"As above except that V dies because her skull was unusually thin. Does D cause V’s death?"

Does D cause V's death. The answer to this question will determine whether or not V is charge with manslaughter. He probably should not be charged for Murder since he would need to have malice aforethought. This could have been implied or expressed malice. Meaning he must have had an intention to cause GBH (implied malice) or intend to kill (Express malice). It will be difficult for the prosecution to prove that D intended to kill V when he chose to place the bar of soap there. However the prosecution might want to charge him with manslaughter since V did die. Can V be considered to be the legal cause. The answer is YES!. The eggshell Skull rule here is applicable. Death was precipitated by the thin skull of the victim, it was still the placing of the bar of soap which initiated the causal sequence, its also the cause of the fall, and the subsequent hitting of the head. Thus Defendant can be convicted of gross negligence manslaughter. 

I will be posting about breaking the causal sequence in part 2. Hope you learnt something new.