Law-
Murder is defined as an unlawful killing of a reasonable creature in being under the King’s peace with malice aforethought, express or implied.
For Helen to satisfy the AR of murder (the unlawful killing) she must be the factual and legal cause of the death. We use the but for test, which shows if the consequence would or wouldn’t of happened ‘but for’ the Ds actions. As in the case of R v White, ‘but for’ him poisoning his mothers drink, she would of died anyway as she died of a heart attack, so he was not guilty of murder. ‘But for’ Helen throwing the firework in the room, Ian would not have died so she was the factual cause of death. Also, the legal causation is necessary, which is where the D must be the ‘operating and substantial’ cause of death, with no intervening acts involved. In the scenario, Helens actions were clearly operating and substantial and there was no break in the chain of causation. Therefore, she is liable for the AR of murder.
However, to prove ‘malice aforethought’ and form the MR of Murder, Helen must have intended to kill or cause GBH, obliquely or directly. The Woolin test is used to see if oblique intention was the result. The test states to obliquely intend to kill, death or serious bodily harm has to be a virtual certainty of Ds actions, and the D must appreciate that death/serious injury is virtually certain of her actions. Helen may not have intended to kill Ian, but throwing a firework in an enclosed space was clearly going to cause serious harm, so Helen would have appreciated serious harm as a result of that action and so satisfies the MR of murder.
Helen could argue two defences to lower her sentence from murder to manslaughter, loss or control and diminished responsibility.
The first defence would be loss of control under the Coroners and Justice Act 2009. If Helen can show that she lost control and killed due to