Your weekly SQE Prep Quiz has arrived
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Hope you had a great weekend. Please see below for the question, the answer to the previous question and associated resources. You can view a web version of this newsletter by clicking here.
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This Week’s Question: A company brings a contractual claim for £100,000. During proceedings, it makes a valid Part 36 offer to accept £80,000, allowing a 21-day relevant period. The defendant rejects the offer and the case proceeds to trial. The company is awarded exactly £80,000. The claim is not subject to fixed recoverable costs, the offer was not withdrawn, and the court considers that applying the normal Part 36 consequences would not be unjust. Which of the following best describes the costs consequences?
A. The company receives its costs on the standard basis throughout because it did not obtain a judgment more advantageous than its own offer.
B. The company receives its costs until expiry of the relevant period but must pay the defendant’s costs incurred after that date.
C. The company receives indemnity costs from the date the offer was made and automatically receives interest at 10% above base rate.
D. The company benefits from the enhanced Part 36 consequences because the judgment is at least as advantageous as its own offer.
E. The Part 36 offer has no special costs consequences because the company had to obtain more than £80,000 at trial.
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Last Week’s Question: During an argument, a man deliberately stabs a woman in the abdomen, intending to cause her really serious injury but not to kill her. At hospital, doctors explain that she will probably survive if she receives an immediate blood transfusion. She refuses the transfusion because of a sincerely held religious belief and dies from blood loss. Medical evidence confirms that the stab wound remained a substantial and operating cause of death. Which of the following best reflects the man’s likely criminal liability?
A. He is guilty only of manslaughter because murder requires an intention to kill rather than an intention to cause serious injury.
B. He is guilty of murder because he intended to cause grievous bodily harm and the woman’s refusal of treatment does not break the chain of causation.
C. He is guilty of causing grievous bodily harm with intent because the woman’s refusal of treatment became the legal cause of death.
D. He is not guilty of homicide because the woman made an informed and voluntary decision that resulted in her death.
E. He is guilty of attempted murder because he intended serious injury, but the prosecution cannot attribute the eventual death to him.
Correct answer: B. He is guilty of murder because he intended to cause grievous bodily harm and the woman’s refusal of treatment does not break the chain of causation. Feedback: The actus reus of murder is the unlawful killing of another person. The mens rea is an intention to kill or to cause grievous bodily harm, meaning really serious injury. The prosecution does not need to prove that the man specifically intended death. His admitted intention to cause really serious injury is therefore sufficient for murder if causation is established. The woman’s refusal of the blood transfusion does not break the chain of causation. Under the principle established in R v Blaue [1975] 1 WLR 1411, a defendant must take the victim as found, including the victim’s sincerely held religious beliefs. The law does not assess whether it was reasonable for the woman to refuse treatment. Because the original stab wound remained an operating and substantial cause of death, the man legally caused her death notwithstanding that a transfusion would probably have saved her life.
The other options are incorrect because:
A wrongly states that murder always requires an intention to kill.
C wrongly treats the refusal of treatment as replacing the stab wound as the legal cause.
D overlooks the thin-skull principle and the continuing causal effect of the wound.
E is wrong because attempted murder requires an intention to kill, and the victim in fact died.
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Dr Ioannis (Yannis) Glinavos
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