Intention

Front 1

Intention - must be given its normal meaning: purpose or aim.
It is the most blameworthy state of mind.

Back 1

R v Moloney [1985]:
"Leave it to the jury's good sense to decide whether the accused acted with necessary intent."
D charged with step-father's murder. They'd been drinking heavily and had a game to see who could load a shotgun quickest. M pointed shotgun at step-father's head and shot and killed. Said it was an accident. Went to the HoL. Lord Bridge said that death must be a natural consequence of these actions.

Front 2

Intention and foresight must be distinguished - just because something is unlikely to occur does not mean it is not intended.

Back 2

Hancock v Shankland:
Ds were standing on a motorway trying to distract drivers by pushing blocks off the edge of the bridge, one of which landed on a car and killed someone. They said this wasn't their intention. Went to HoL. Lord Scarman said the more foreseeable, the more likely it is to be intended.

Front 3

The jury must be persuaded beyond reasonable doubt that D intended the result.

Back 3

Haigh:
Mother smothered her child but it wasn't clear how or in what circumstance, so judge persuaded the jury that they could not be persuaded beyond reasonable doubt that she intended to.

Front 4

Oblique intention = where D embarks on a course of conduct to bring about a desired result, knowing that the consequence of his actions are likely to bring about another result.

Back 4

Gillick v Norfolk:
Girl under 16 with contraceptive pill. When doc prescribed the pill, was he encouraging under-age sex? Civil law case discussing the potential for criminal liability. Both questions answered yes but jury can still find no oblique intention.
Nedrick:
D put a petrol bomb through V's door to frighten but caused the death of her child. Was it a virtual certainty? Oblique intention.
Re A:
conjoined twins. If twins were separated, one would die. Virtually certain.

Front 5

D intends if:
- the circumstance/result is a virtual certainty; and
- D foresees it as a virtual certainty.
AND
- the jury choose to find intention (if not, it is recklessness).

Back 5

Woollin:
Borderline intention/recklessness authority.
Previous case of Nedrick [1986] established that death or GBH must be a 'virtual certainty'. In Woollin, the judge confused virtual certainty with 'substantial risk', which blurred the line between intention and recklessness, and hence between murder and manslaughter. This englarged the scope of the MR required for murder. Should stick to Nedrick test of virtual certainty.
FACTS: father killed 3 year old son by throwing him on the floor in a fit of anger. Conviction of murder quashed and manslaughter conviction substituted.

Front 6

Antony Duff's 'test of failure' = if the result had not occurred, would D regard himself as having failed?

Back 6

Does not work so well where there is a means to a desired end, e.g. killing someone to obtain inheritance money.

Front 7

Intention and motive/desire must be distinguished - you can intend a result without wanting it to happen

Back 7

Hales:
D ran over a police officer while escaping arrest. He did not want the police officer to die but was "prepared to kill in order to escape" and thus intended it.

Front 8

Hyam [1975]:
Old test - "highly probable"

Back 8

"Highly probable" test heavily criticised as being wrong.
Moloney rectified this.

Front 9

Lord Steyn's change of word 'infer' to 'find' in Nedrick

Back 9

May be because it is an easier word for juries to understand.
Or may be to suggest that foresight of virtual certainty is not just evidence from which one could infer intention but actually is intention.

Front 10

Alan Norrie - 'After Woollin'

Back 10

The law of indirect intention may still remain unclear after the HoL decision in Woollin.
Woollin is not as clear in its own terms as has been suggested, and there are underlying reasons, connected with the conflict in mens rea between moral and factual approaches, why any surface clarity may not endure. These reasons are seen in relation to a broader moral conception of malice that may still remain attractive to some judges, in the light of which foresight of virtual certainty represents an under-inclusive test, and in relation to a narrower moral conception of what it means to intend to do something, in the light of which Woollin appears over-inclusive.
The cognitivism of the law of intention cannot reflect these broader moral issues, yet they remain central to the judgment of criminal culpability.
Another case with different moral facts, reflecting a more manifest malice, could well let the Hyam genie out of the bottle. Indeed the broader spirit of Hyam has always lurked...