Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person:
The most common non-fatal offence that is committed against the person is common assault. This is a summary offence which carries a six month prison sentence. It is made up of two seperate offences, assault, and battery. It it traditionally thought of as a common law offence, however it is recognised in statute, in the Criminal Law Act 1967. In the case of R v Little it was said to be considered as a statutory offence.
Assault is when one person causes another person to apprehend the immediate application of unlawful force - Ireland; Burstow. This can be via actions alone, as seen in Smith v Chief Superintendent of Woking Police Station; it can be through words alone, as seen in Constanza. It can even
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It covers such things as kissing, hugging, slapping, or even throwing a drink over a person (Savage). Battery also covers indirect actions, such as in DPP v K, or using a person as an 'instrument' for battery - Haystead v Chief Constable of Derbyshire. All of these can be the actus reus of the offence.
The principle of transferred malice (Latimer) can be invoked in battery cases. This is where the defendent has the mens rea of the offence, but the actus reus ends up affecting another person.
Section 47, as laid out in the Offences Against the Person Act 1861, is also known as Assault Occassioning Actual Bodily Harm. It is an either-way offence and carries a maximum penalty of five years in jail. It deals with the least serious cases of harm.
Unlike battery, the offence of ABH requires the victim to have some form of injury. This may be physical (hair is covered, DPP v Smith), or psychological - emotions are not covered, but diagnosible psychiatric conditions are (Chan Fook). Any of these can be the actus reus of this crime.
Broken teeth, minor cuts requiring stitches, and loss of conciousness are often tried under
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The defendant but be the legal and factual cause of the victim's injury. Meaning "but for" their actions the defendant would not have suffered harm (Pagett, White), and they are the "operating and substantial cause" of the victim's injuries (Cato). In S47, the "thin-skull" rule also applies. The defendent must "take his victim as [he] finds him" and take responsiblity for all injuries caused by the victim's "thin skull" - Blaue.
The rules of causation also require no intervening acts. The victim themselves may break the chain of causation with an intervening act, but only if their actions are unreasonable - Roberts, Williams.
The mens rea for S47 is the same as for assault or battery. The defendent need only intend the victim to either apprehend immediate unlawful physical force, or for the victim to have unlawful physical force applied to their person. As long as the assault or battery that occassioned the actual boldily harm was intended or there was sufficient recklessness (Cunningham) then the prosecution needn't prove that the defendent had even the slightest foresight or intention for the harm they actually caused - DPP v Parmenter;
To prove tort of battery; Simon must establish that Caroline, Intentionally caused an offensive contact with him, that the force was direct and immediate, and the touching or contact was hostile.
….Where the conduct of the accused induces in the victim a well-founded apprehension of physical harm such as to make it a natural consequence that the victim would seek to escape and the victim was
In order to be convicted on a criminal charge, proof is required of three things; actus reus, mens rea and causation. The accused must have the criminal state of mind relevant to the crime he is accused of. Intention is a far more blameworthy aspect than recklessness,
You can be charged with, and convicted of simple assault even if no one was physically hurt by your behavior. As a result, far too many people who have no criminal history, and never thought they were doing anything that was against the law, get convicted and
The crime of indecent assault and battery occurs when an attacker, has non-consensual physical contact with a person in a sexual manner. This could be any unwarranted physical contact to a person’s private body. This assault is punishable to up to five years in prison.
Defences of Assault and Battery In most crimes there are always defences to the offence that has been
“A person is guilty of aggravated assault if he or she attempts to cause serious bodily injury to another or causes such injury purposely, knowingly, or recklessly under circumstances manifesting extreme indifference to the value of human life; or attempts to cause or purposely or knowingly causes bodily injury to another with a deadly weapon. In all jurisdictions statutes punish such aggravated assaults as assault with intent to murder (or rob or kill or rape) and assault with a dangerous (or deadly) weapon more severely than "simple" assaults.”
Assault is an intentional or reckless act that causes someone to put in fear of immediate physical harm, e.g. pointing a gun at the claimant by the defendant, the claimant need not know if the gun is real one. Assault must be intentional, direct and immediate. Battery is the intentional or reckless application of physical force to another person. While, false imprisonment is an unlawful restriction of the claimant’s freedom of movement by the defendant.
In some states, they have made it a crime to assault officials. Twenty states have made it a crime. In Illinois, it is a minimum of $...
Battery and assault fall under the law of tort, which is an amalgamation of obligations, rights,
beatings. The same can be achieved by the assaulter by threatening someone with a gun. This
In this essay, I will describe the elements of a criminal act, address the law of factual impossibility, the law of legal impossibility, and distinguish whether the alleged crime in the scenario is a complete but imperfect attempt or an incomplete attempt. I will address the ethical or moralistic concerns associated with allowing a criminal defendant to avoid criminal responsibility by successfully asserting a legal defense such as impossibility. The court was clearly wrong to dismiss the charge against Jack of attempted murder of Bert.
However, they are not involved in a physical altercation. In contrast, some crimes can be considered sexually violent, yet not criminal. For instance, crimes such as sexual harassment, statutory rape, or sexual battery offenses can be believed to be sexually violent; however, while intrusive, these crimes may not always fit the legal criteria for prosecution—each jurisdiction of what they will and will not
A defence in criminal law arises when conditions exist to negate specific elements of the crime: the actus reus when actions are involuntary, the mens rea when the defendant is unaware of the significance of their conduct, or both. These defences will mitigate or eliminate liability from a criminal offence. Insanity, automatism and diminished responsibility are examples of said defences. They each share characteristics but can be distinguished in their scope and application.
“It has long been established that any touching of another person, however slight, may amount to battery. Everybody is protected not only against physical injury but against any form of physical molestation.” In R v Thomas (1985), it was stated, obiter, that touching the bottom of a woman’s skirt was equivalent to touching the woman herself. A battery can be committed even where defendants thought their behavior was affectionate.