Fall Term Legal Studies Assignment,
Assignment for Law 51.100V,
Group #3,
Question number 2.
In our second case, this is a case of murder and judge Lord Coleridge may have found Jill guilty of murder. Jack is on the plank and Jill pushes him off to save her own life. Again it is the need Jill has to live by getting on the plank that creates a defence by necessity.
Judge Lord Coleridge may have looked at Bacon and not seen the clear case of the plank this time. The act of pushing Jack off was like that of slitting Parkers throat in R. v. Dudley and Stephens. It was contributing to the bad circumstances of the deceased, and caused the death.
Jill could argue that she could not swim and that she valued her life. Perhaps she had a child or could have children and Jack did not have a family to support. But this would have been the same argument that Dudley and Stephens made so would have brought a guilty verdict.
Suppose that the judge saw that she was a women and that it was Jack's duty to give up the plank to Jill as the judge might have read the judge's search of the legal literature and attitudes towards duty, in Dudley and Stephens. This means he wanted the women to survive. But I think this was Jack's duty not Jill's necessity in pushing Jack from the plank. So again duty does not work. A policy of violently asserting male duty for necessity would not be a good message to set down in the law books. It would not be good policy. Although if Jack had willingly given up the plank this would Jack's acceptance of his duty.
Judge Lord Coleridge would have Jill guilty of murder. He would have pondered the duty Jack had in this case as the others but would have seen that Jill acted against Jack's staying on the plank. This question is the most similar case to R. v. Dudley and Stephens. This case is murder in principle because Jill pushed Jack off the plank.
