## Facts

- Jim Smith drove a car carrying stolen scaffolding clips in sacks.
- A police constable signaled Smith to pull over; Smith accelerated instead.
- The constable held onto the moving car; Smith drove fast and erratically to dislodge him.
- The constable fell into the road, was struck by another vehicle, and died from his injuries.
- Smith drove on, disposed of the stolen property, and later returned; he said he was frightened and only wanted to shake the officer off.
- Smith was charged with capital murder.

## Issues

1. For murder, is intent to kill or cause grievous bodily harm determined objectively by what a reasonable person would foresee as the natural and probable consequences of the defendant’s act, or subjectively by what the defendant actually intended or foresaw?

## Decision

- The House of Lords allowed the prosecution’s appeal and restored the murder conviction.
- The court held the trial judge correctly directed the jury using an objective “reasonable person” test tied to natural and probable consequences.
- The court rejected the appellate court’s view that the jury had to be directed solely on Smith’s actual (subjective) foresight or intention.

## Legal Principles

- Where a defendant is legally capable of forming intent (e.g., not insane and without diminished responsibility), the law may treat a person as intending the natural and probable consequences of a voluntary unlawful act.
- After determining the defendant’s knowledge of the external circumstances and the nature of the act, the key question is whether grievous bodily harm was a natural and probable result, judged by what the ordinary responsible person would have contemplated.
- Under this approach, a defendant’s asserted lack of actual foresight of serious harm does not negate murder intent if serious harm would have been foreseen by a reasonable person on the same facts.

## Conclusion

The House of Lords held that, for murder, intent to cause grievous bodily harm could be established by an objective assessment of whether such harm was the natural and probable consequence of the defendant’s voluntary unlawful conduct, and it reinstated Smith’s murder conviction on that basis.


Dir. of Pub. Prosecutions v. Smith, [1961] A.C. 290 (H.L. 1961)