R v Moloney [1985]

1. Facts:

• The defendant (Moloney) and his stepfather were drinking heavily.

• During a drunken argument, Moloney accidentally fired a gun, killing his stepfather.

2. Outcome:

• The Court of Appeal substituted Moloney's murder conviction with manslaughter.

• The court held that Moloney did not have the necessary intention for murder.

3. Impact and Analysis:

• Foresight of Consequences: To assess foresight of consequences, judges should ask:

◦ Did the defendant foresee the outcome as a natural consequence of his actions?

◦ Was death or grievous bodily harm (GBH) a natural consequence of those actions?

• Lord Bridge's Perspective:

◦ Lord Bridge stated that foresight of consequences is "little short of overwhelming."

◦ He emphasized that foreseeability and intention are different states of mind.

◦ Foresight of consequences should be used as evidence of intention, rather than equating the two.

• Confusion and Legal Precedent:

◦ This approach created confusion, as it blurred the distinction between foresight and intention.

◦ The ruling took the law back to the complexities seen in R v Smith (1961), which Parliament had sought to clarify through subsequent legislation.

◦ The case highlighted the difficulty in defining and applying the concepts of intention and foreseeability in criminal law.

• Legal Principles:

◦ The ruling in Moloney suggested that foreseeability of consequences can be used to infer intention but should not be directly equated with intention.

◦ This differentiation is crucial for ensuring that individuals are only convicted of murder when they truly intended to cause death or serious harm.