R v Roberts [1971] EWCA Crim 4

Roberts drove a young woman in his car and, after unwanted sexual advances, she jumped from the moving vehicle, suffering injuries. Convicted of assault occasioning actual bodily harm, he appealed. The Court of Appeal held the trial judge’s causation direction correct and dismissed the appeal.

Facts

The appellant, Kenneth Joseph Roberts, was tried at Cheshire Quarter Sessions on an indictment alleging indecent assault and, in the alternative, assault occasioning actual bodily harm on a 21-year-old woman.

The complainant had visited an American military base in Lancashire, where she was friendly with personnel and engaged to an American serviceman. She later went to a party and met the appellant for the first time. Around 3 a.m. she left with him in his car, having agreed to travel to what he said was another party in Warrington.

After leaving Warrington in the direction of Liverpool, she queried where the party was and was told they were going to Runcorn. They took an unusual route and eventually stopped on a large cinder track at about 4 a.m. The complainant stated that the appellant then sexually assaulted her in the car:

“He just jumped on me. He put his hands up my clothes and tried to take my tights off. I started to fight him off but the door of the car was locked and I couldn’t find the catch. Suddenly he grabbed me and then he drove off and I started to cry and asked him to take me home. He told me to take my clothes off and if I didn’t take my clothes off he would let me walk home, so I asked him to let me do that. He said if he did he would beat me up before he let me go. He said that he had done this before and had got away with it and he started to pull my coat off. He was using foul language”.

She said she told him:

“I am not like this”

and he replied:

“You are all like that”.

After he drove on, she stated:

“Again,”

“he tried to get my coat off so I got hold of my handbag and I jumped out of the car. When I opened the door he said something and revved the car up and I jumped out. The next thing I remember he was backing towards me and so I ran to the nearest house. He backed and shouted and then he drove off”.

She ran, distressed, to a nearby house, was taken to hospital, treated for concussion and grazing, and detained for three days. She said in cross-examination:

“I was fighting for my life to get him off. He had hold of me while he was driving. I probably struck him when he was trying to drag my coat off, although I didn’t strike him in the face. He was travelling at about 45 miles an hour when I jumped out of the car”.

At another point she said:

“That was the last straw. I opened the door and jumped”.

A woman from the house she reached confirmed her distressed condition.

Roberts accepted that the complainant had jumped from his moving car, but gave a different account. When first interviewed, in connection with a possible charge of rape or attempted rape, he stated:

“It’s not like you say, all of it. She was game and led me on. Then she changed her mind and stopped. I was angry but so would you. I drove off. When she jumped out I wasn’t going very fast”.

In his evidence he described the complainant as having made advances, then changing her mind, leading to an argument. He said:

“I called her a cow. She hit me and I got hold of her arms and she was shouting and bawling. I drove along about two miles and suddenly she opened the door and flew out. I was going to take her home. I stopped the car about 15 yards further on. I was going very slowly because of the argument”

“If it was more than 20, it was very little more. I reversed back and I dropped the window and said, ‘don’t be daft’.”

There was evidence that the complainant had been drinking (she had a tumbler with alcohol in the car), but the examining doctor did not consider her drunk, and the appellant himself said she was just “merry”.

The jury acquitted Roberts of indecent assault but convicted him of assault occasioning actual bodily harm. He was fined. He appealed against conviction, raising a point of law concerning the trial judge’s directions on causation.

Issues

1. Causation in assault occasioning actual bodily harm

The central issue was whether the appellant could in law be held responsible for the actual bodily harm suffered when the complainant jumped from the moving car. The jury had to determine whether her injuries were caused by an assault by Roberts or by some independent, voluntary act on her part (including any effect of alcohol) that broke the chain of causation.

2. Correctness of the trial judge’s direction

The complaint was that the Chairman at Quarter Sessions misdirected the jury by effectively telling them that if they accepted the complainant’s version of events they must convict, without adequately directing them on causation and foreseeability.

The Chairman had explained:

“the matter arises in this way. The Prosecution say, that is to say, Miss Bell says, that driving along in the car, after the scene on the car park, the Defendant, she says, started trying to take her coat off. That act, in the context of the conversation that had been going on, if it was against her will, was an assault. The Prosecution say that was, for her, the last straw”.

He then directed that:

“That act, that assault, say the Prosecution, caused her to jump from the car. If, therefore, you find that it was an assault, that is to say, find that the Defendant did try to take her coat off and that she was not consenting and because of that she jumped out of the car and injured herself, then that would be an assault occasioning actual bodily harm, but you have to be satisfied that there was an assault and that it was that assault that caused the harm”.

Later he added:

“That, in point of time and space, takes us some five or ten minutes on and about two miles down the road. At that stage Miss Bell says, ‘He was telling me what he had done to other women, the effect of his conversation was that he was going to have his way with me, and then he started to take off my coat. That was the last straw. I opened the car and jumped’.”

He continued:

“If that be true, then without doubt, that is an assault and it occasioned actual bodily harm. Your verdict would be guilty upon that charge. His version is, ‘We were arguing. Of course, I was frustrated at being stepped when I was stepped but I had nothing really to do with her jumping out of the car. It was merely a result of a verbal battle between us. She suddenly opened the door and before I could do anything she had gone’. If that be right, there was no assault. Certainly you would acquit on that- charge. But, once more, remember it is for the Prosecution who have brought the charge to prove it. If you are sure that their version be right, convict, but not otherwise”.

On appeal, it was argued that this failed to require the jury to be satisfied that the appellant’s conduct, and not alcohol or other reasons, caused the injuries, and that the judge ought to have told the jury they must be satisfied that the appellant foresaw that she might jump as a result of his conduct.

Judgment

Approach to causation and foreseeability

The Court of Appeal (Criminal Division), constituted by Lord Justice Stephenson, Mr Justice Thompson and Mr Justice Bridge, reviewed earlier authorities, including Beech (1912) 7 Cr App R 197, where a woman had jumped from a window and the defendant was prosecuted for inflicting grievous bodily harm. The Court noted that in Beech the trial judge had directed the jury:

“Will you say whether the conduct of the prisoner amounted to a threat of causing injury to this young woman, was the act of jumping the natural consequence of the conduct of the prisoner, and was the grievous bodily harm the result of the conduct of the prisoner?”

That direction had been approved, and Darling J observed:

“No-one could say”

that:

“if she jumped from the window it was not a natural consequence of the prisoner’s conduct. It was a very likely thing for a woman to do as the result of the threats of a man who was conducting himself as this man indisputably was”.

The Court held that this correctly stated the law. It rejected the submission that the defendant must actually foresee the specific action (such as jumping from a car or window) taken by the victim. Instead, the test is whether the victim’s reaction was the natural result of what the assailant said and did, in the sense of being something that could reasonably have been foreseen as a consequence of that conduct.

The Court explained that if a victim does something so unexpected or “daft” (echoing the appellant’s own word) that no reasonable person could be expected to foresee it, then the act of the victim may break the chain of causation and the harm would not in law be the result of the assault. However, where the response is a reasonably foreseeable consequence of the defendant’s conduct, causation is established even if the defendant did not in fact foresee that particular response.

Application to the facts

The Court held that, given the evidence, the jury was entitled to accept the complainant’s version of events and to reject the appellant’s account. Their verdict on the indecent assault count indicated that they did not accept all of her evidence in relation to the earlier conduct, but the conviction on the assault occasioning actual bodily harm count showed that they accepted her account as to what led her to jump from the car.

If her evidence was accepted, Roberts had subjected her to unwanted sexual advances, used threatening and abusive language, indicated he had previously “done this before” and “got away with it”, and started to remove her coat while driving. On that basis, her act of jumping from the moving vehicle could properly be regarded as a natural and reasonably foreseeable reaction to his conduct, and the injuries thereby sustained were legally caused by his assault.

The Court considered whether the Chairman’s summing up incorrectly compelled the jury to convict. It concluded that, in substance, the judge had properly put before the jury the two competing accounts. He had told them, in effect, that if they believed the complainant’s account, they should find an assault which caused the harm, and if they believed the appellant’s account – that he did nothing beyond arguing and that her jump was not connected to any assault – they should acquit.

This approach was consistent with the correct legal test for causation. The jury were not misled into thinking that any injury following any contact must be attributed to the defendant; they had to be satisfied that there was an assault, and that the assault caused the complainant to jump and so suffer actual bodily harm.

Outcome

The Court found no misdirection in the summing up and rejected the grounds of appeal. The appeal against conviction was dismissed. When defence counsel sought a certificate that the case raised a point of general public importance, the Court refused, Lord Justice Stephenson stating that they could not say that it did so.

Implications

This decision confirms that, in offences such as assault occasioning actual bodily harm and inflicting grievous bodily harm, causation can be established where the victim’s reaction is a natural result of the defendant’s conduct and reasonably foreseeable, even if the defendant did not actually foresee the exact manner of the victim’s response.

Victims’ attempts to escape from perceived or threatened violence, even when involving risky conduct like jumping from a moving car, do not necessarily break the chain of causation. The key question is whether the reaction was so unforeseeable or “daft” that no reasonable person could have anticipated it; if not, the defendant remains responsible for the resulting harm.

The case is a significant authority on causation in criminal assault, particularly where the harm arises through the victim’s flight from the defendant’s actions or threats.

Verdict: Appeal against conviction dismissed; the conviction for assault occasioning actual bodily harm and the sentence imposed at Quarter Sessions were affirmed.

Source: R v Roberts [1971] EWCA Crim 4