Paper Topic:

CRIMINAL LAW

Gross Negligence Manslaughter : Assessment of whether the Current Law in this Area is Unsatisfactory or Uncertain

To conclude that a Gross Negligence Manslaughter was committed by an individual , the following conditions must be satisfied . First , there must be a duty owed by the defendant to the victim . Second , there must be a breach of this duty that brings the victim to a risk of death Third , the breach causes the victim 's death . Fourth , there must be circumstances of breach which are so bad that is tantamount to gross negligence (Simester and

Sullivan

Negligence , as it is generally defined , is a failure to exercise a reasonable level of precaution given the circumstances and so may include both acts and omissions . Furthermore , manslaughter as it is explained in the English law of homicide is a less serious offence than murder with the law differentiating between levels of fault based on mens rea (a Latin term for a guilty mind (Wikipedia .org

Manslaughter can be categorized as voluntary or involuntary Manslaughter is said to be voluntary if an individual was intentionally killed by the accused . Although the killing was intentional , the accused is not liable for murder because of two possible reasons - the accused defended his self because of any provocation or he has less responsibility that will reduce the offence from murder to manslaughter or the accused survived from a suicide pact . On the other hand manslaughter is involuntary if the accused had no intention to cause death or any serious injury but caused death of an individual through recklessness (defined as a wanton disregard for the dangers of a particular situation ) or criminal negligence . Often , the defendants of manslaughter by gross negligence are people whose jobs require special skills or care . Examples of them are doctors , police or prison officers or electricians who failed to meet the standard which is expected from them , consequently causing death (Wikipedia .org

In this , the case of Dr . Misra and Dr . Srivastava will be examined . Dr . Misra and Dr . Drivastava were senior house officers . A patient had an injured tendon in his knee . Because of this , he had had routine surgery to treat it . The doctors are the ones who were responsible for the patient 's post operative care . HYPERLINK "http /mydropbox .com /g .pl ?i 503129 d d24654d1291741f338a4ecf0 \l " \t "_blank " Because of a toxic shock syndrome , the patient died The toxic shock syndrome was caused by a rare bacterial infection . The patient had a rare bacterial infection because his wound became infected . HYPERLINK "http /mydropbox .com /g .pl ?i 503129 d d24654d1291741f338a4ecf0 \l " \t "_blank " Because the patient died , manslaughter by gross negligence was charged to the defendants . The bases why they were charged with gross negligence by manslaughter were the following (1 there was an allegation that they owed a duty of care to the patient (2 ) that patient 's nature of illness did not have any sufficient diagnosis , so , the defendant committed a breach of his duty . In addition...

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