Recognising the Role of the Emotion of Fear in Offences and Defences

Abstract

Anger, its part in human conduct and in crime commission has been much discussed and accorded a privileged status within the law, while the role of fear has been less considered. Notwithstanding, fear and related emotional states have received some recognition as intrinsic elements of the perpetrator’s object integral to the actus reus of certain offences and relevant to the defendant’s mens rea of some defences. The harm caused by deliberately or negligently instilling fear in another is inconsistently considered in law as is its impact on criminal responsibility and mens rea. Fear has been recently acknowledged as a permissible cause of loss of self-control in a partial defence to murder (Coroners and Justice Act 2009 s 55(3)). It remains a contested emotion and as with anger the male experience of what circumstances trigger fear predominates.

Honour Suicide and Forced Suicide in the UK

“…On the other hand, fear experienced by abused women is underestimated somewhat by requiring or assuming the need of physical violence to trigger it. Thus, although defences are assessed with consideration of the 'relevant circumstances' in a case, a hierarchy of circumstances related to what is reasonable and relevant 118 is again assessed on the male understanding and interpretation of such circumstances. Therefore, a gender sensitive approach and interpretation of such concepts may be beneficial when assessing HBV and DV induced crimes in the cases where the victims are female.…”

Allowing a Defence to Those Who Commit Crime Under Coercive Control

“…108 As Edwards discusses, this means that a householder could receive more protection under the law than an abused woman. 109 To address this, when the Domestic Abuse Act was recently debated in Parliament, it was proposed that a provision should be inserted to allow the amount of reasonable force used by an abused woman to mirror the existing provisions in householder cases. 110 The Commons, however, voted against this amendment with the Government arguing wrongly that such an amendment was not necessary as there is no 'significant evidence demonstrating that the current full and partial defences available are failing victims of domestic abuse accused of crimes against their abuser'.…”