When the gross negligence of one person causes the death of another, an offence of manslaughter is committed. However, as a Court of Appeal case concerning a young woman’s tragic death from a drug overdose showed, within that simple statement lies a wealth of legal complexity.
The woman died on her 25th birthday after her boyfriend supplied her with drugs at a music festival. He was convicted of gross negligence manslaughter on the basis that he owed her a duty of care but had failed to summon medical assistance even when it became obvious that her life was in danger. He was sentenced to a total of eight and a half years’ imprisonment for that and other offences.
Ruling on his challenge to the conviction, the Court noted that the prosecution was required to establish to the criminal standard of proof – beyond reasonable doubt – that there was a serious and obvious risk to the woman’s life, that he was grossly negligent in failing to obtain medical assistance for her and that such assistance would have saved her life.
In upholding his appeal and quashing the conviction, the Court found that the prosecution had failed to exclude the realistic possibility that the woman would have died even had she received timely medical treatment. Taken at its highest, expert medical evidence in the case fell short of establishing to the criminal standard that his gross negligence caused her death.