Attorney General for Northern Ireland v Gallagher [1963] AC 349<\/strong><\/p>\n Criminal \u2013 murder \u2013 relevance of intoxication \u2013 defence of insanity and intoxication<\/em><\/p>\n Patrick Gallagher was convicted of murdering his wife. It was also known that he was a psychopath.<\/p>\n Whether Gallagher was insane at the time of killing or was incapable of forming an intent necessary to constitute murder as he was drunk. Secondly, whether the M\u2019Naughten test<\/strong> had been correctly applied.<\/p>\n The court held that there had been no misdirection by the trial judge. Lord Denning reaffirmed the law on drunkenness as a defence to crime. Lord Denning applied the test from DPP v Beard<\/em><\/strong> [1920] A.C. 479<\/strong>, in that, if Gallagher was found to be so drunk that he did not know what he was doing, no intent to murder is formed. Beard<\/em><\/strong> was distinguished as Gallagher was aware of what he was doing and had formed an intent to kill his wife, remembering he had done so afterwards. The second part of the test was that if Gallagher\u2019s drinking had bought about a distinct disease of the mind, such that he is temporarily insane within the application of M\u2019Naughten\u2019s Rules<\/strong> (the insanity test) and that he did not know what he was doing or what he was doing was wrong, then Gallagher could rely on the defence of insanity. Lord Denning found that alcohol had not caused him a \u2018disease of the mind\u2019. Even though he was a psychopath, this was not brought on by drink. Gallagher was found to have committed murder as there was clear evidence of premeditation. The fact that he got drunk before the act and was drunk when committing it was only to provide him with a little \u2018dutch courage\u2019 required to commit murder. The appeal was allowed and the conviction of murder was restored.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Whether Gallagher was insane at the time of killing or was incapable of forming an intent necessary to constitute murder as he was drunk. Secondly, whether the M\u2019Naughten test had been correctly applied.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[85],"class_list":["post-5113","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cases","tag-uk-law"],"yoast_head":"\nFacts<\/h3>\n
Issues<\/h3>\n
Held<\/h3>\n