Actual Bodily Harm

Cards (11)

  • Assault Occasioning Bodily Harm
    • Not a standalone offence
    • There must be an initial assault or battery which has led to harm being done
    • Could be causation issues as one thing must result in another
    • Harm can be physical or psychiatric
    • Low-medium level harm
    • MR is only the MR of the assault or battery which led to the harm, nothing else needs to be proven
  • Triable Either Way offence

    S47 Offences Against the Person Act 1861
  • Assault Element

    • Either an assault and/or battery
    • Same case law as usual applied to establish this
  • Occasioning Element
    • Means the same as causation
    • Normal rules of causation – Factual/Legal
    • If there is a direct/physical attack then causation is immediately established
  • Miller: '"Any hurt or injury calculated to interfere with the health or comfort of the victim"
  • Psychiatric Harm

    • Can be ABH
    • Mere emotion such as panic, fear, and distress will not suffice
    • Needs to amount to a clinical condition
  • Mens Rea
    • Is the mens rea for the assault or battery, nothing more
    • No mens rea needed for further harm
  • Chan-Fook: "Not so trivial as to be wholly insignificant"
  • Smith: "A substantial amount of hair is to be treated as part of the body"
  • T v DPP: "Momentary unconsciousness"
  • Physical or Psychiatric harm must be caused