THIS PAPER IS NOT TO BE REMOVED FROM THE EXAMINATION HALL

DIPLOMA IN LAW/CertHE COMMON LAW LA1010 October

LLB
BSc DEGREES WITH LAW

Criminal law

Wednesday 9 October 2019: 10.00 – 13.15

DO NOT TURN OVER UNTIL TOLD TO BEGIN

Candidates will have THREE HOURS AND FIFTEEN MINUTES in which to

answer the questions. Candidates must answer all parts of a question unless
otherwise stated.

Candidates must answer the COMPULSORY questions in PART ONE and

THREE from the SIX questions in PART TWO.

Permitted materials
Candidates are permitted to bring into the examination room the following
specified document: one copy of Core Statutes on Criminal Law 2018-19
(Palgrave Macmillan).

© University of London 2019

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PART ONE

Candidates must answer these COMPULSORY questions.

1. Read the following paragraphs and answer the questions that follow.

Doris is a contract killer. She has a contract to kill Vincent. She is driving
to Vincent’s house with her gun when she is involved in an accident after
a pedestrian unexpectedly runs out in front of her car. The pedestrian is
badly injured. Doris gets out of her car to discover the victim is Vincent.
Doris, pleased that she has been saved some effort and mistakenly
believing Vincent to be dead, leaves Vincent on the road. Vincent is killed
some moments later when a car, driven by Jyoti, drives over him. Jyoti
did not see Vincent on the road, because she was speaking on her
mobile phone. Jyoti gets out the car, sees Doris and shouts for help.
Wanting not to be identified, Doris aims and fires her gun at Jyoti,
intending to kill her. Jyoti is unharmed but Charles, a bystander, shocked
by the noise, suffers a heart attack and dies.

Discuss the criminal liability of Doris.

(a) If you were a prosecutor what would be your preferred charge of

homicide, murder or manslaughter, in relation to the killing of
Vincent?

(b) Give reasons for your choice in (a) above.

(c) If you were Doris’s defence counsel, what argument(s) could you
advance against her potential liability for homicide?

(d) If you were prosecuting counsel, how would you respond to such
argument(s)?

(e) If your argument(s) in (c) above were successful, what offence, if

any, would Doris have committed in relation to the car accident?
Give reasons.

(f) If you were a prosecutor, what would be your preferred charge of

homicide, murder or manslaughter, in relation to Charles’s death?
Give reasons for your answer.

(g) If you were Doris’s defence counsel, what argument(s) against

criminal liability for homicide would you advance?

(h) If your argument(s) in (g) were successful, what offence(s), if any,

would Doris have committed?

(i) What is your overall conclusion about Doris’s criminal liability in

this problem?

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PART TWO

Candidates must answer THREE questions in this section.

2. Alma has been married for 20 years. Her husband, Nathan, has
consistently bullied her. He refuses to allow her to take paid
employment, to go out with her friends or to take driving lessons. He also
belittles her in company and gives her only a tiny housekeeping
allowance saying that he cannot afford more. Alma discovers that
Nathan has a secret bank account containing £100,000 and that he pays
a monthly allowance of £1,000 to a secret lover. She is outraged and,
when Nathan takes his bath an hour later, she connects an electric fire
to an extension lead, enters the bathroom and throws the electric fire
into the bath, electrocuting him and resulting in his death.

Discuss whether Alma may be able to raise the defence of loss of self-
control and evaluate the applicable law.

3. Is the current distinction between sane and insane automatism

satisfactory? What changes, if any, would you recommend?

4. Explain and evaluate the concept of dishonesty in domestic criminal law.

5. “There is one coherent thread underpinning the law governing causation

which is that people should be held accountable for the consequences
of their own unlawful actions unless it would be clearly inappropriate, for
reasons of morality or common sense, to hold otherwise.”

Discuss.

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6. Consider the potential liability as an accessory of Arthur, Dele, Nasser
and Greta in the following three separate scenarios:

(a) Paula is the CEO of a finance company. Wishing to raise extra

capital to finance expansion she decides to advertise for
depositors, promising to pay one per cent above standard bank
rates on deposit accounts. Arthur, her solicitor, draws up
contractual documents for intending depositors and takes a
deposit from Dele. Unknown to all of them it is a strict liability
offence for non-banking enterprises to take deposits.

(b) Imran and Nasser agree to kill Connor and go to Connor’s house
to do so. The agreement is to batter Connor over the head with a
baseball bat and leave him at the bottom of the stairs to make it
look as if Connor had fallen. They kill Connor as agreed. By
chance, Connor’s wife, Vera, returns home as they are leaving
the house and Imran kills Vera with a gun, which Nasser did not
know Imran was carrying.

(c) Jane asks Greta, a gunsmith, for a replica gun, which looks ‘as
authentic as possible’. Greta believes it is to be used to hold up a
bank but he sells Jane the gun anyway. In fact, Jane modifies the
gun so that it is capable of firing bullets. She kills Victor, a counter
assistant in a bank, with it.

7. During a professional football match between Frensham FC and

Rowledge Rovers, Ade, a Frensham player, tackled Bharat, a Rowledge
Rovers player, from behind, to prevent him passing the ball. The tackle
caused Bharat to fall on top of Charlie, who suffered a broken ankle. This
led to an argument between Ade and Bharat in which Bharat was heard
to threaten Ade with serious violence. Ade then punched Bharat causing
cuts and bruises. Immediately after the incident, Desi, the referee,
approached Bharat to see if he was all right. Bharat, confused as a result
of the punch, punched Desi, who sent him off the pitch. At a disciplinary
hearing Rowledge Rovers sacked Bharat. Bharat decided to get even
with Ade. Every night for a month he made silent telephone calls to Ade
and, on a number of occasions, sent anonymous letters to his house
saying ‘I know where you live’. This had the consequence of causing
Ade’s partner, Ekisha, to suffer long-term panic attacks and depression.

Discuss.

END OF PAPER

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