{"id":843,"date":"2009-04-05T14:42:28","date_gmt":"2009-04-05T13:42:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sixthform.info\/lawblog\/?p=843"},"modified":"2009-04-05T15:01:53","modified_gmt":"2009-04-05T14:01:53","slug":"843","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sixthform.info\/lawblog\/?p=843","title":{"rendered":"R v Evans manslaughter by omission – drug overdose"},"content":{"rendered":"
\r\n\t\"carly_townsend\"\r\n\t
carly_townsend<\/div>\r\n<\/div>On the 2 April the Court of Appeal convened a rare 5 judge panel to decide whether a victim suffering from a drug overdose was owed a duty to act by the person who had contributed to her condition. They found she was owed a duty to act.<\/p>\n

R v Evans [2009] CA<\/strong>
\n [Gross negligence manslaughter \u2013 actus reus <\/em>\u2013 omission – state of affairs life threatening – duty to act]<\/strong>
\nD failed to summon help for overdosing victim to whom she had given drugs. D was V\u2019s older half-sister, who was 16 years old. D and V and their mother were heroin addicts. D gave heroin to V who self-injected and overdosed. D and her mother put V to bed, hoping that she would recover, while they watched Emmerdale on TV.\u00a0 She died during the night.<\/p>\n

Held<\/strong>: For the purposes of gross negligence manslaughter, when a person had created or contributed to the creation of a state of affairs that he knew, or ought reasonably to have known, had become life threatening, a consequent duty on him to act by taking reasonable steps to save the other’s life normally arose.<\/p>\n

D had been under a plain and obvious duty to take reasonable steps to assist or provide assistance for the victim.<\/p>\n

The prosecution case was based solely on her negligent omission to summon medical help when the deceased was suffering from a heroin overdose.<\/p>\n

The relationship between D and the deceased did not of itself create a duty to act.<\/p>\n

D was under a duty to take reasonable steps for the safety of the victim once she had appreciated that the heroin she had procured for her was having a potentially fatal impact on her health.<\/p>\n

Guilty<\/strong>
\nR v Adomako [1994] applied; R v Miller [1983] considered; Airedale NHS Trust v Bland [1993] considered; R v Wacker [2003] considered; R v Kennedy (No 2) [2008] considered; Mitchell v Glasgow City Council [2009] HL considered; R v Willoughby [2005] explained.<\/p>\n

Comment<\/strong>: This case was heard by 5 judges because it raised an important point of law. The proposition that a supplier of drugs owes a duty of care to the customer is not supported by the authorities.\u00a0\u00a0 D\u2019s involvement in the supply to her sister of the fatal dose of heroin could not found a conviction for manslaughter on the basis of her unlawful and criminal act. (R v Kennedy (No 2) an authority expressly stated to have no application to gross negligence manslaughter).<\/p>\n

This appeal was not about the supply of the heroin.<\/p>\n

The facts did not create a duty between step-sisters as it did with the mother.<\/p>\n

D was under a duty to take reasonable steps for the safety of the deceased once she appreciated that the heroin she procured for her was having a potentially fatal impact on her health.<\/p>\n

The court agreed that there is an inconsistency between the authorities.<\/p>\n

D was sentenced to 4 years her mother 2 years.
\nThe deceased Carly Townsend was 16 years old.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

BBC report here<\/a>
\nWhole case here<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

carly_townsend On the 2 April the Court of Appeal convened a rare 5 judge panel to decide whether a victim suffering from a drug overdose was owed a duty to act by the person who had contributed to her condition. They found she was owed a duty to act. R v Evans [2009] CA [Gross […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-843","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sixthform.info\/lawblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sixthform.info\/lawblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sixthform.info\/lawblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixthform.info\/lawblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixthform.info\/lawblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=843"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixthform.info\/lawblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":853,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixthform.info\/lawblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843\/revisions\/853"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sixthform.info\/lawblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=843"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixthform.info\/lawblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=843"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixthform.info\/lawblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=843"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}