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CASES UNDER MENS REA

INTENTION
1. Bhagwant Appaji v Kedari Kashinath
Held : the definition of intent implies aim and thus connotes the one object from which
the effort is made.
2. Ramkumar v State
BRIEF FACTS ;
2nd Respondent possessed a field by the side of Shankar River. 2nd Respondent used to take
water from the river to his field for irrigation purposes. 2nd Respondent did not have electric
connection. It was claimed by the prosecution that he was taking illegal electric connection.
On 2nd May, 1999 a boy, named Santosh, who was aged about 11 years, died due to electric
shock by coming in contact with the live wire through which 2ndRespondent was illegally
taking electric connection. Some persons gave statements that the boy was swimming in the
river and the wire accidentally broke and fell in the water resulting in the boy being
electrocuted.
HELD ;
- Appeal was allowed and the meaning of intent was established in this case.

NEGLIGENCE
1. Balakrishnan S v PP
BRIEF FACTS ;
- Appellants were commanding officer and the supervising officer of a prisoner of war
training course which was conducted by the Singaporean Armed Forces.
- One soldier had died and another seriously injured due to being dunked 4 times each
20 seconds in a tub containing about 2 feet of water.
High Court Held ;
- The appellants claim that he did not realise that dunking peoples heads in water was
dangerous had been dismissed by the HC.
TRANSFERREED MALICE
1. R v Latimer
BRIEF FACTS ;
- Tracy, Latimer's daughter, was 12 years old and had very severe cerebral palsy and
was constantly in pain. She was to have an operation that would reduce the pain, but it
was going to inflict a lot of pain in the process. Rather than put his daughter through
continued pain, Latimer killed her by putting her in his truck and blocking the tailpipe
where she died of carbon monoxide poisoning. Latimer denied it at first saying she
had died in her sleep, but eventually confessed. He said that he had considered more
inhumane ways to kill her, and decided that this was the best.
Principle ;
- If a man carries out an unlawful act with the requisite M.R and his unlawful act
causes harm that he desired, even if to an unintended person, he would still be found
guilty.
HELD ;
- Latimer was convicted of second-degree murder at trial and his appeal was dismissed.

2. R v Mitchell
BRIEF FACTS ;
- The defendant, having become involved in an argument whilst queuing in a post
office, pushed an elderly man, causing him to fall accidentally on the deceased, an
elderly woman, who subsequently died in hospital from her injuries. The defendant
was convicted of unlawful act manslaughter. He unsuccessfully appealed on the
ground that his unlawful act had not been directed at the victim.
HELD ;
- although there was no direct contact between the defendant and the victim, she was
injured as a direct and immediate result of his act. Thereafter her death occurred. The
only question was one of causation and the jury had concluded that the victim's death
was caused by the defendant's act. The actions of the elderly man in falling on the
victim were entirely foreseeable and did not break the chain of causation between the
defendant's assault and the victim's death. Dalby was distinguishable on its facts as a
case where the victim was not injured as a direct and immediate result of the
defendant's act. In addition, the court saw no reason of policy for holding that an act
calculated to harm A cannot be manslaughter if it in fact kills B: see Latimer (1886).
3. R v Pembliton
BRIEF FACTS ;
- The defendant threw a stone at another person during an argument. The stone missed
the intended victim, but instead broke a nearby window. He was charged with
malicious damage to property and was convicted.
HELD ;
- The court, in quashing the conviction held, that the doctrine of transferred malice was
inapplicable where the defendant's intention had not been to cause the type of harm
that actually occurred. His intention to assault another person could not be used as the
mens rea for the damage that he had caused to the window.

COINCIDENCE OF AR AND MR

1. FAGAN V METROPOLITAN POLICE COMMISSIONER


BRIEF FACTS ;
- Fagan was asked to park his car closer to the kerb, which he did. He also parked on a
police officers foot, and subsequently refused to move his car and offed the ignition
of the car.
HELD ;
- Although there was no intent in parking on the foot of the officer, the omission to
move was an intentional, therefore the omission was classed as an act. Applied the
same transaction approach. The fault element of the case was only present in the
later part of the transaction.

2. Thabo Meli v R
BRIEF FACTS;
- The defendants had taken their intended victim to a hut and plied him with drink so
that he became intoxicated. They then hit the victim around the head, intending to kill
him. In fact the defendants only succeeded in knocking him unconscious, but
believing the victim to be dead, they threw his body over a cliff. The victim survived
but died of exposure some time later. The defendants were convicted of murder, and
appealed to the Privy Council on the ground that there had been no coincidence of the
mens rea and actus reus of murder.
HELD ;
- The appellants had caused the death of the victim. Although the doctrine of
coincidence requires the actus reus and mens rea of a crime to coincide in time, the
course of conduct of murder continued up until the victims death. Applied the same
transaction approach because the fault element of the crime concerned was present
during the earlier part of the transaction but absent in the later part.
-

3. Shaiful Edham bin Adam v PP


BRIEF FACTS ;
- The appellants had inflicted several wounds on the victim before disposing what they
thought was a corpse into a canal.
- The autopsy showed that the victim was then still alive and had died by drowning and,
furthermore, that her wounds would have bled slowly for hours so as to cause her to
lapse into unconsciousness and to appear dead.
HELD ; Appellants appeal was dismissed and they were charged for murder because they
had caused death of the victim. Applied the same transaction approach because the fault
element of the crime concerned was present during the earlier part of the transaction but
absent in the later part.

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