R V TAJ CASE NOTE

Case name and citation

R v Taj [2018] WLR(D) 482. [2019] QB 655, [2018] 2 Cr App R 32, [2018) MHLR 326, 2019] 1

All ER 346, [2019] 2 WLR 380, [2019] Crim LR 167, [2018] EWCA Crim 1743

Court and judges

Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): Lord Justice Gross, Lord Justice Davis, Mr Justice Haddon-Cave
and Sir Peter Openshaw.

Partles

The Crown and the Defendant (Taj)

Material facts

On 31st January 2016 Mr Taj was driving along a road drove past Mr Awain’s car which was stalled
due to engine malfunction. Mr Taj decided to pull over and help Mr Awain. During the inspection he
came across some electrical equipment and wires which had smoke surrounding it in the car boot.
Little did Mr Taj know that Mr. Awain was an electrician and his work required him to carry his
electrical equipment in his car. The smoke from the equipment was due to previous attempts to
jump-start the car. However, Mr Taj based on this, assumed that Mr. Awain was a terrorist and hit
him multiple times on the head. Consequently, he was charged with attempted murder and causing
GBH to Mr. Awain.

However, Mr Taj claimed that he had been drinking heavily a few days prior to the incident. Not only
that he claimed that he had been an alcoholic and drug addict since a teenager and has been
suffering from psychosis. It was claimed that Mr Taj was under a drug induced psychosis at the time
of crime and the defence argued that he acted in such a way in order to protect himself and the
public from the bomb threat that he perceived to be true.

Issues of law

The issue in law is whether the defendant, Taj, could rely on the defense of being ‘insane’. The courts
also had to determine whether the court of first instance accurately interpreted sec 76!5) of the
Criminal Justice Act 2008

Decision

The Court of appeal dismissed the defendant’s appeal against his conviction for attempted murder.
The court held that the trial judge did not err in law when withdrawing self-defence from the jury.
The court’s interpretation of sec 76(5) of the 2008 Act was held to be correct. The court held that
voluntary intoxication that led to taj’s temporary psychosis was insufficient to provide a legal
defense.

Detailed reasons for the decision

Although Taj was under a mistaken belief that Awain was a terrorist, and this may warrant a legal
defence under s.76(4)(b) as the mistaken belief was one which he genuinely believed it to be or to
have made. However pursuant to s.76(5) Taj couldn’t avail himself to self-defence as the mistaken
belief he held, was in fact caused by voluntary intoxication. It was noted that at the time of the
incident there were no traces of alcohol or drugs in Taj’s body. This proved that Taj was not
intoxicated hence would not be allowed to rely on the said defence.

Previous cases like R v Coley; R v McGhee; R v Harris held the same view whereby if Taj were to be
regarded as being in a state of ‘voluntary intoxication’, there must exist signs or traces of alcohol or
drugs that is actively present in his system at the time of crime being committed. As traces of neither
drugs nor alcohol were present, intoxication is not the cause of the psychosis episode.

Mr. Taj appealed against the conviction of attempted murder on the grounds that the trial judge had
erred in law by rejecting the claim of self-defense. He argued that when committing the said crime
he was under the genuine belief that he was acting in self-defense because he was under a state of
psychosis that made him believe that the victim was a terrorist who intended to harm his life.

However the fact that Taj was held liable for attempted murder shows that he had the intention to
kill or cause grievous bodily harm at the time of commission of crime His mistaken belief, that was
induced by psychosis, did neither refute his mens rea for attempted murder nor excuses his
wrongdoing. This goes on to reinstate the fact that this case does not concern ‘insanity’ and
voluntary intoxication cannot support it which was why it was not successfully established.

The ratio decidendi

The main issues considered by the court when dismissing Taj’s appeal would firstly, be the Court of
Appeal’s affirmation of the Crown Court’s decision of distinguishing R v Harris and held that the
occurrences of psychosis could continue for weeks even after the substances has been expelled out
of our bodies. However, this does apply to long term mental illness caused by drugs or alcohol. The
Crown Court has adopted a different interpretation of “attributable to intoxication” under section
76(5) as the intoxication in psychosis in Harris was attributable to voluntary abstinence unlike in Taj
which involved voluntary consumption of alcohol. Accordingly, the courts applied DPP v Majewski
and dismissed Taj’s appeal.

The Court held that the Crown Courts’s decision to withdraw self-defence from the jury was correct
as the jury would be unable to conclude whether the force Taj used for “self-defence” was
reasonable or not. The courts in considering the second limb of the two limbed rule on self-defence,
the court adopted the interpretation laid down in R v Oye and R v Martin (Anthony), where in normal
cases, ‘reasonableness’ would be an issue that is decided by the jury. In these cases, the defendants
were permitted to rely on mistaken self-defence while under mental psychosis, however it was
deemed irrelevant to decide whether the force is one which a reasonable person would use. Since it
is unlikely that there would ever be a reasonable psychotic person and also whether a reasonable
person would have believed there to be no threat, the defence was withdrawn. The court upheld
Taj's conviction for attempted murder, stating that voluntary intoxication that causes psychosis would
not excuse criminal liability.