Murder

• Lord Coke's definition - 'The unlawful killing of a reasonable being under the King's peace with malice aforethought, express or implied'.
• Most serious of the fatal offences and carries a mandatory life sentence.
• AR can be an act or omission (Gibbins and Proctor) which must have caused the death and must be unlawful (not in self defence).
• Law Reform's Year and a Day Act - there is no time unit for the death after the killing, although if its after 3 years, the AG's consent is required.
• AG reference No.3 - a foetus can't be killed, but if a foetus is injured, born alive, and then later died due to the injury, it can form the AR for murder.
• Killing an enemy during war is not murder as its not under the King's peace.
• No clear legal definition of being dead, but its usually defined as brain stem death (Malcherek).
• D must have intention to kill (expressed malice aforethought) or intent to cause GBH (implied malice aforethought) (Vickers, Cunningham).
• GBH - really serious harm (Smith).
• Foresight of the consequences is evidence of intention (Moloney), oblique intent can be shown if death/serious injury was a virtual certainty and D appreciated this (Woolin test).