How far drunkenness can be successfully pleaded as a defence to a charge of murder was elaborately argued before the House of Lords the other day and the principle of Law established in the reversal of the judgment of the Court of Criminal Appeal by the House of Lords is of more than passing interest. Arthur Beard, a mill-worker of Cheshire, outraged and killed a girl of thirteen. He was tried on a charge of murder before Mr. Justice Ballhache and it was argued on behalf of the accused that he was so drunk that his crime should be pronounced ‘man-slaughter’ and not murder. Upon this issue Mr. Justice Ballhache directed the jury that they could only return a verdict of man-slaughter upon proof that the accused did not know what he was doing or he did not know what he was doing was wrong. No such proof being offered, the jury returned a verdict of guilty of murder. The case was taken to the Court of Criminal Appeal which, disagreeing with the summing up of Mr. Justice Ballhache, held that he should have put to the jury the further question whether the prisoner was so drunk that he was incapable of knowing what he was doing was dangerous.
