unlawful act

• Unlawful act manslaughter


  Defined in common law as an unlawful and dangerous act that caused death
• 4 stage test

  • D commited an unlawful act
  • Unlawful and dangerous on an objective test (church test)
  • Directly caused the death of victim (causation) - included injection
  • Mens rea of the original unlawful act
• D committed an unlawful act
• must be an act, not an omission (Rv Lowe)
• The unlawful act must be a criminal offence, not a civil wrongdoing (Rv Franklin)
• The unlawful act must be completed (satisfied and met all elements), unlike Rv Lamb where the defendant wasn't convicted of assault as there was no unlawful act
• Goodfellow case held arson was an unlawful act (arson is an illegal act itself)
• Dangerous act


  • Considered dangerous on an objective test (church test) - a sober and reasonable person would regard the act as dangerous and foresee a risk of some physical harm (not necessarily serious harm)
  • Rv JM and SM further stated that the sober and reasonable person doesn't have to foresee the actual/specific harm caused, just that some physical harm will be caused
• The unlawful act can be aimed at property, not just a person (Rv Goodfellow)
• Watson - reasonable person would foresee that threatening an elderly frail person would lead to a risk of some harm due to their vulnerability and fragility
• The act doesn't have to be aimed at the victim (Rv Larkin - can be transferred malice)
• Causation


  • Factual causation - 'but for' test
  • Legal causation - 'de minimis rule' - defendant's actions must be an operating and substantial cause of victim's death
• Thin skull rule - takes the victim how you found them (Rv Blaue)
• If the defendant administers/injects a harmful substance (drugs) to the victim, it is considered unlawful (Rv Cato)
• If the victim administers/injects a harmful substance into themselves, it is not unlawful as the victim's act breaks the chain of causation (Rv Kennedy)
• The defendant must have the required mens rea of the original unlawful act, not the killing or causing GBH (DPP v Newbury)
• DPP v Newbury - house of Lord held it’s not necessary to prove the d to foresee any harm of their act (had mens Rea of their original crime - intend criminal damage