Automatism

• Automatism - AG’s Ref No. 2 of 1992


  COA held that there must be “total destruction of voluntary control”

  -> the actions of the D must be completely involuntary
• Automatism - cause of the involuntary act

  must be external i.e, a blow to the head, an attack by a swarm of bees, sneezing, and the affect of a drug.

  Exceptional stress (R v T)

  Diabetes - the involuntary action must be as a result of taking insulin in order to be automatism (Quick)

  Any condition caused by diabetes would be an internal factor and the D would have to rely on insanity (Hennessey)
• Automatism - self-induced


  If the automatism is self-induced due to the D acting recklessly, they would not be able to rely on the defence of automatism (Bailey)