House of Lords · Majority; Lord Jauncey giving the leading speech; Lord Lowry dissenting
Facts
The defendant was sixteen years old. His father threatened to kill him if he did not kill his mother, and the defendant stabbed his mother, who survived.
History
The defendant was convicted of attempted murder after the trial judge ruled that duress was not available as a defence. The Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) dismissed his appeal and he appealed to the House of Lords.
Issue
Whether duress by threats is available as a defence to a charge of attempted murder, given that it is not available as a defence to murder.
Held
Appeal dismissed; duress is not a defence to attempted murder.
Ratio
- The reasons for denying duress as a defence to murder, namely that the law should not allow a person to prefer his own life to that of another, apply equally to attempted murder.
- The defendant who attempts murder must be proved to have intended to kill, which is the same mental element as for murder, and the fact that the victim survives does not reduce the culpability that the law requires.
The judgments
Lord Jauncey of Tullichettle (lead)
He held that there was no logical or moral basis for treating an attempt to kill differently from a killing for the purposes of duress, since the attempter had the intention to kill, and that the policy of the law required a refusal to extend the defence.
Lord Lowry (dissenting)
He would have allowed the defence to be left to the jury, reasoning that the policy against duress for murder should not be extended to a lesser offence where the victim had survived.
Key reasoning
- The leading authority on murder had held that duress should not be available to a principal in the first degree, and its reasoning applied to the intent to kill rather than to the outcome.
- A distinction between murder and attempted murder would produce an anomaly, since a defendant who succeeded in killing could not rely on duress while one who failed might be able to.
- Any change to the rule was a matter for Parliament, which could reconsider the law on duress as a whole.
Where it fits in the module
In Topic 8 on defences, duress is the clearest example of an excuse that the law limits for policy reasons. Gotts raises the debate over whether the exclusion for the gravest crimes is justified in principle, in particular where the defendant is young and under severe pressure.
Criticisms
- Denying duress to a young person who was threatened with death by a parent punishes someone whose will was overborne, which is hard to reconcile with the idea that criminal liability depends on a fair opportunity to conform to the law.
- The reasoning treats the attempter as equally culpable as a murderer, ignoring that the result is a relevant moral difference, which sits oddly with the lower penalties imposed for other attempts.
- The policy that the law should demand heroism in the face of threats is a blunt rule, and the House left no room for a structured defence with a proportionality requirement.
Written with AI (claude-sonnet-5.5 (Claude Code writer)) on 1 November 2026, reviewed for errors by a second model (claude-sonnet-5.5 (Claude Code checker)). Read the case itself at [1992] 2 AC 412, [1992] 2 W.L.R. 284. Spotted an error? Tell us.