Robinson-Pierre v R

Section 3(1) of the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991 creates a strict-liability offence, but not one of absolute liability. The prosecution must prove an act or omission by the owner or person in charge which caused or permitted, to a more than minimal degree, the dog’s being dangerously out of control in a public place. It is insufficient that the prohibited state of affairs arose solely through a third party’s act. Where the evidence raises a possible causal contribution after the dog’s escape, the jury must decide that issue. A direction that causation is irrelevant renders a conviction unsafe if it deprives the defendant of the opportunity to meet that case.

The appellant was tried at Inner London Crown Court for offences under section 3(1) of the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991. Police officers entered his locked home under a search warrant. His dog then attacked several officers, first within the property and later in the street.

The judge withdrew one count because the relevant attack occurred on private property. The jury convicted the appellant on three counts concerning officers injured in public. The judge directed that the offence was strict liability and that it did not matter whether the appellant had caused or contributed to the dog’s escape or lack of control.

On appeal, the central issue was whether section 3(1) required an act or omission by the owner or person in charge which contributed to the dog’s being dangerously out of control in a public place.

1. Appeal allowed. The convictions were unsafe because the jury had been directed that any act or omission by the appellant was irrelevant to guilt.

2. The Court confirmed that section 3(1) of the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991 creates a strict-liability offence. Mens rea is not an ingredient. Parliament may, where the statutory language and purpose require it, create an offence based on a prohibited state of affairs without a causal link to the defendant. That possibility does not determine the construction of this provision.

3. Read with sections 3(2) and 3(3), section 3(1) assumes that either the owner or another person is in charge of the dog and able to control it. The statutory defence for an owner who reasonably entrusted the dog to a fit and proper person showed that Parliament did not intend the owner to be liable in every circumstance regardless of how the prohibited state of affairs arose.

4. The Court explained Bezzina, Codling & Elvin [1994] 99 Cr App R 356 as deciding that section 3(1) imposed strict liability, while reserving the question whether liability arose where a third party was wholly responsible. Section 3(1) requires proof of an act or omission of the defendant, with or without fault, which caused or permitted the prohibited state of affairs to arise to a degree greater than minimal.

5. On the evidence, the jury should have decided whether the appellant’s failure to attempt to control the dog after it escaped had contributed to its being dangerously out of control in public. Although such a finding was likely, the appellant had not been given the opportunity to meet that case because the judge had ruled causation irrelevant. The Court could not therefore be sure that the verdicts were safe.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) Allowed the appeal against conviction and quashed the convictions: [2013] EWCA Crim 2396.
• Inner London Crown Court The appellant was convicted on three counts under section 3(1) of the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991 after one count had been withdrawn from the jury.