Defect in judge’s charge on intoxication could not be remedied by reference to speeches from counsel

McKechnie J (nem diss): Murder - conviction of murder of mother - offer of plea to manslaughter - diminished responsibility - intoxication - whether judge misdirected jury - whether counsel's speeches could remedy any defect in the judge's charge - section 6 of the Criminal Law (Insanity) Act 2006 - mental disorder - history of alcohol and substance abuse - paranoid delusions - voluntary intoxication - reference by judge to counsels' 'hijack' of his charge to the jury - whether sufficient to direct jury that the issue of intoxication was determined on the question of whether the accused had the necessary intent - crime of specific intent.

"[H]e believed that people were spying on him; that the army were looking for him and had used some sort of gas around his house; he poured petrol around the house and was going around with a hatchet; he was seen being cruel to animals; and he believed that there had been a nuclear explosion the previous morning. In interview with the Gardaí he expressed the view that certain people (including, apparently, his mother) had been replaced with imposters."

"The position is now clear, however, that the question for the jury is not whether the accused was so intoxicated as to lack the capacity to form the specific intent required, but whether he did in fact form the intent."

"So viewed, it can be appreciated that the learned judge’s charge to the jury certainly had the capacity to mislead. As all have acknowledged, his charge on intoxication was, to use just one of the many descriptions offered, brief. One thing he was emphatically clear on, however, was that “voluntary taking of drink and drugs does not under our law form a defence or any mitigation in one’s responsibility to society”. This, he told the jury, “is the law”. The judge did not mention what is, on the Appellant’s argument, the fundamental point: that while voluntary intoxication is not a full defence to criminal liability, it could operate to reduce the offence from murder to manslaughter if the jury had a reasonable doubt, stemming from his intoxication, as to his specific intent to kill or cause serious injury to his mother."

" In effect: can the charge be supplemented, and saved, by a correct recitation of the law by counsel? In my view, the short answer is ‘No’. As a matter of routine practice in criminal trials, counsel for both sides will tell the jury, during their opening (where applicable) and closing speeches, that the judge is the master of the law. They will instruct the jury that they are to take the law from the judge, and that where there is any inconsistency between what counsel says to be the law and what the judge tells the jury is the law, the latter must prevail."

Charleton J (concurring): Murder of mother - diminished responsibility - intoxication - history of substance abuse - counsel substituting for a proper judicial direction - reasonable doubt - role of judge - fault and alcohol - drunken intent - involuntary intoxication - future charges to juries on the issue.

"To accede to what the Director of Public Prosecutions has argued for on this appeal is to invite both confusion on roles and would amount to the overturning of the essential architecture of a criminal trial. Instead, counsel should leave legal directions to the trial judge and confine argument to matters of fact with a view towards persuading the jury of the validity of their respective cases or the weakness of whatever case has been made against their client."