Stewart, R. v

Alcohol dependency syndrome is a disease for the purposes of section 2 of the Homicide Act 1957, whether or not it has caused physiological or neurological brain damage. It may constitute a relevant abnormality of mind and substantially impair responsibility where, at the time of the killing, it produces an irresistible craving or compulsion to drink. An earlier voluntary choice to drink does not automatically prevent reliance on diminished responsibility.

Whether alcohol dependency syndrome removed a defendant’s capacity to choose to drink is a medical and factual issue for the jury. A qualified expert may express a clinical opinion that such loss of capacity was not present, provided the evidence does not assert a legal bar to the defence.

The applicant, who had been convicted of murder in 2007, obtained an order quashing that conviction and directing a retrial in March 2009. At the retrial in the Crown Court at Blackfriars, he pleaded guilty to manslaughter by reason of diminished responsibility but was convicted of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment with a 13-year minimum term.

The killing followed an altercation between two homeless men. The psychiatric evidence conflicted on whether the applicant’s alcohol dependency syndrome made his drinking involuntary and substantially impaired his responsibility. The renewed applications, following refusal by a single judge, challenged the admissibility and impartiality of the Crown psychiatrist’s evidence and the minimum term imposed.

1. The renewed applications against conviction and sentence were dismissed, save that the minimum-term order had to be technically corrected.

2. Section 2 of the Homicide Act 1957 requires a disease inducing an abnormality of mind and substantial impairment of responsibility. Alcohol dependency syndrome was, as a matter of law, a disease for those purposes, even without physical damage to the brain. The legal position, following R v Wood, was that a prior voluntary choice to drink did not preclude diminished responsibility where alcohol dependency syndrome had produced an irresistible craving or compulsion to drink at the time of the killing.

3. The court distinguished that legal rule from the factual medical question whether a particular sufferer had in fact lost the capacity to choose to drink. Dr Chesterman was entitled to say, from his clinical experience, that he had not encountered such a case. His view conflicted with the defence expert’s view and was for the jury to assess. It was not an error of law or evidence of bias, particularly as he accepted the medical possibility of involuntary drinking through alcohol dependency syndrome. The trial judge correctly directed the jury that compulsive and involuntary drinking could constitute an abnormality of mind.

4. The 13-year minimum term was not manifestly excessive. The court accepted the 15-year starting point and held that the brutal and sustained attack, the applicant’s previous violent offending, and the mitigating features had been fairly balanced.

5. Under Schedule 2 paragraph 3 of the Criminal Appeal Act 1968, the minimum term should have been expressed as 13 years less 319 days, equivalently 12 years and 46 days. It was to run from 16 July 2007, the date on which the original life sentence began. The sentence was set aside and reformulated to that extent.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): In this judgment, [2010] EWCA Crim 2159, the court dismissed the renewed applications against conviction and sentence, but corrected the statutory formulation and commencement of the minimum term.
• Crown Court at Blackfriars: The applicant was originally convicted of murder on 16 July 2007. That conviction was quashed on appeal on 26 March 2009 and a retrial was ordered. At the retrial, he was convicted of murder on 10 July 2009 and sentenced to life imprisonment with a 13-year minimum term.