Aidid v The Queen (Rev 1)

Where there is sufficient evidence that voluntary intoxication may realistically have prevented formation of the specific intent required for an offence, the trial judge should normally direct the jury on that issue. This is so even if the defendant’s own case is that they knew what they were doing or were not involved.

The direction must make clear that a drunken intent remains an intent, while requiring the jury to consider all the evidence, including intoxication, when deciding whether they are sure of the requisite intent. An omission or imperfect formulation will not inevitably make a conviction unsafe. Safety depends on the evidence, the issues at trial and the directions as a whole.

The appellant was convicted by a jury at the Central Criminal Court of the murder of Hamdi Juimala. Her case at trial was that she had not taken part in the fatal attack and had been asleep during it. There was evidence that she had consumed alcohol and lacked sleep.

On appeal, she contended that the judge’s directions inadequately addressed whether intoxication may have prevented her from forming the intent to kill or cause really serious bodily harm. The central issue was when a judge must direct a jury on voluntary intoxication in an offence of specific intent, what the direction must say, and whether any deficiency made the conviction unsafe.

1. Appeal dismissed. The judge’s directions, read as a whole, were clear and sufficient. They required the jury to be sure that the appellant intended to cause really serious bodily harm. They also told the jury to take alcohol into account while bearing in mind that a drunken intent remains an intent.

2. Where sufficient evidence makes it a realistic issue whether alcohol or drugs may have prevented formation of specific intent, the judge should normally give an intoxication direction. The issue does not depend on the defendant positively advancing intoxication as their case. Juries may reject the parties’ respective accounts while remaining unsure whether the prosecution has proved every ingredient of a specific-intent offence.

3. The court endorsed the direction in R v Sheehan and Moore (1974) 60 Cr App R 308. The jury should be told that drink does not assist a defendant if the necessary intent was in fact formed, but must consider all the evidence relating to drink when deciding whether they are sure that the requisite intent existed. Directions should be tailored to the facts. Important legal directions should not be placed in footnotes, which may impede jurors’ understanding.

4. A failure to give the direction, or a failure to reproduce the established wording exactly, does not automatically render a conviction unsafe. The appellate court must assess the case as a whole, including the evidence, the issues actually tried and all the other directions. Unlike cases of positive misdirection, the present judge did not suggest that intoxication was irrelevant.

5. Although the appellant’s primary case was that she was asleep and uninvolved in the final attack, the judge expressly identified drunkenness and lack of sleep when posing the issue of intent. The conviction was therefore safe.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): Dismissed the appeal against conviction, holding that the direction on intoxication and intent was sufficient.
• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division): On 30 October 2020, corrected the sentence on a technical basis to custody for life with a minimum term of 15 years less time served. The renewed application for leave to appeal sentence on substantive grounds was refused.
• Central Criminal Court: On 8 April 2016, Judge Wide QC and a jury convicted the appellant of murder and imposed a life sentence.