The Journal of Criminal Law

This article considers whether there is a rationale for criminalisation of the sexual transmission and exposure to HIV by reviewing the harm principle. The article then provides a comparative jurisdictional analysis of transmission and exposure in three particularised jurisdictions: England, Canada and the US. It will be established that few jurisdictions truly consider the risk of serious harm, and thus lack a theoretical foundation for criminalisation. A comparison of relational judicial precepts will follow the discussion of extant law in each country. The final part of the article proposes a bespoke new legislative framework that will criminalise certain types of transmission and exposure.

The revolution of the partial defences to murder by the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 may have had a catastrophic impact on cases of mercy killing.¹ While previously shoehorned into the diminished responsibility plea, the medicalisation of this defence may prevent such a ploy. However, a recent case has offered insight into the circumstances which may still result in a manslaughter conviction for mercy killers through a new avenue previously thought impermissible. This article will discuss the case and those similar, alongside charging decisions and just results. Mercy killing remains a grey area in the criminal justice system, but is there light at the end of the tunnel?

This article postulates that the House of Lords took a wrong turn in Adomako, missing the opportunity to revise the Caldwell/Lawrence guidance on recklessness, to produce a more appropriate determinant of criminal liability for inadvertent conduct causing death. It will be advocated that gross negligence manslaughter is replaced with reckless manslaughter utilising an objective capacity–based test. A proposal that encompasses both acts and omissions will be advanced which is theoretically underpinned by a hybrid theory of culpability. It will be contended that this hybrid theory best represents current approaches to criminally reckless conduct in practice and produces a morally apposite method of ascertaining criminal responsibility where the risk of death was not foreseen.

A consideration of the current sentencing principles, the Sentencing Guidelines, and the difficulties that have emerged. A discussion of the changing sentencing principles, and the need for reform. Readers are urged to respond to the consultation.