No person can consent to their own death, or to injury to cause death

Guardian Opinion Article

From the above....."The Labour MP Harriet Harman is leading efforts to amend the domestic abuse bill in such a way as to eliminate the defence of consent in cases of actual bodily harm, serious injury or death ( bringing into statute a prohibition that already exists in case law )". My highlight in bold.

I wonder if the editorial writers know what 'already exists in case law' even means and maybe they'll wonder why we need to eliminate again the eliminated. Not that I think that the said case R v Brown broke new legal ground - it merely confirmed the position.

This is another classic example of click-bait beloved of the internet. Those half-wit MPs are no better.

"Immature" "Catty" ??
Or maybe just repelled at this particular discussion about this woman's murder. I'm going to hide this thread now as I'm just not into people trying to find ways of discussing whether shoving a container of cleaning fluid up a drunk woman's vagina leading to her painful death might possibly be consensual and the "principles and laws" that relate to it.

Let's face it, death by choking /strangulation isnt an instantaneous thing, youd need to keep applying force for a (relatively) long period of time.

Yes agreed, it seems a very strange activity all round - what on Earth are they thinking.

If a reasonable person would have anticipated that the act would lead to death, then it's murder, consent is irrelevant

That's exactly what is meant by 'intent' in murder cases.

But apparently, when you deliberately cut off someones oxygen supply, death is not seen as something that could be reasonably anticipated it's not as if oxygen is a fundamental ingredient for life...

Let's face it, death by choking /strangulation isnt an instantaneous thing, youd need to keep applying force for a (relatively) long period of time.

Let's hear your non immature take on this case then, given its accepted she was too fucked to consent, and the extent of her injuries. And that she is not around to say whether she consented to them or not, as she's dead. And that either way, she was not in a fit state to consent to anything.

Calling women immature for having serious concerns about the sentence the man got for this is a new low tbh.

If I walked up to a stranger in the street, gave them a knife and asked them to stab me in the chest, I technically would have consented to that. If the person stabs me and I die, it’s still murder. I will possibly get flamed for saying this but I’m hoping you can see where I am coming from. If someone dies unexpectedly in a sex game gone wrong and the person responsible really didn’t think death was possible from the particular sex game they were carrying out, then I would have a degree of sympathy.

As far as I understand it, that's the exact crux of it. If a reasonable person would have anticipated that the act would lead to death, then it's murder, consent is irrelevant.

If it is something where someone might have not anticipated that it would lead to death, then consent becomes (or may become) a factor. If there was consent, it might be more of an accident with no one at fault. But with consent it could still be manslaughter, too, depending on the circumstances.

If there wasn't any consent then it wouldn't be an accident though it could be murder or manslaughter as well as assault.

I read it as goose saying that if it were the one injury, it would be plausible as an accident as people do insert stupid things into themselves to see if it’s pleasurable (though ime that’s usually men sticking things up their arse!). However given the extent of her injuries, and that he left her there, you can see why it wasn’t a successful defence.

Yeah, that's what I was saying.

I find it, I don't know, disturbing? that on threads like this, where people are talking about the general topic and principles and laws, as well as the specific case, that making a comment about those things invariably results in a bunch of catty comments claiming that somehow there is an underlying attempt to justify whatever.

Several people said outright or implied that people don't do things like insert foreign objects into their bodies and damage themselves. My comment was just that in my experience, that's not the case, and alone it wouldn't be a reliable indicator of what was going on in a situation. Just a straightforward comment on something some people seemed to be saying.

I don't get the immature bs these discussions get - there are lots of people who don't comment on what are important topics because they know they'll get jumped on if they stray from a very narrow script, in an extremely personal way too.

New Zealand were way ahead of us on women's suffrage. Hopefully this is a sign they intend to be way ahead of us re #wecan'tconsenttothis

If I walked up to a stranger in the street, gave them a knife and asked them to stab me in the chest, I technically would have consented to that. If the person stabs me and I die, it’s still murder. I will possibly get flamed for saying this but I’m hoping you can see where I am coming from. If someone dies unexpectedly in a sex game gone wrong and the person responsible really didn’t think death was possible from the particular sex game they were carrying out, then I would have a degree of sympathy. The nature of this ladies injuries were horrific. Bleach sprayed on her face? A trigger spray bottle inserted into her? I also read that in order to remove the spray bottle, the defendant had to snap the lid part off. I think this may have caused the hemorrhage? All this while she was completely incapacitated after the huge alcohol & drugs binge. How could this possibly be anything other than murder????

Oh well consent “in fact” sounds like a fantastic concept

Thanks Fraggling for explaining what a terrible idea it is

The criminal compensation people tried to get out of paying compensation to lots of victims of child sexual exploitation by saying that while the men had been convicted, and there was not consent in law, there had been consent 'in fact'.

I see this distinction that seems to be coming up more as a very worrying, fancy sounding way of saying she was literally asking for it.

Very troubling.

If a person is too fucked to know what's going on that is a crime, in law. And it needs to stop there or we get stacks of grey area shit and back 100 years and we aren't in a great place already.

Well, I’ll play along. If only because this is getting me seriously irritated and it shows why we’ve got Badley Fuckitt.

If “in law” one cannot consent to anything past ABH, why does it matter in this case that she supposedly consented “in fact” to her injuries? What is the difference?

Secondly, does consent “in fact” have any basis in law? That is a genuine question. It’s not a concept I’ve ever come across.

Where’s the proof she liked pain during sex?
I know some people do, but where’s the proof she did?
Or is it just him saying she did?

It was like that girl who was choked and raped down an alleyway, pretty sure the defence was she ‘liked it rough’.
Where’s the prof, other than these men saying it?

Despite being fucked off her head she consented to bring so brutally abused she died?

This gets better.

She's dead.
She can't tell her side of the story.

No idea why saw is defending her killer.

But “in fact” she may have been consenting to the injuries.

How could she have been consenting to the injuries when 'in fact' she had so much alcohol in her system that it contributed to her death? It would be impossible surely?

The 'facts' are, he beat the shit out of her and then left her to die.

Same not Some

Sawdust, do you have an explanation legality wise for the contradiction of Natalie Connelly being too drunk/doped up to stop him (and to the extent that it was cited as contributing towards her death), and the fact that legally one cannot consent to sex (making the "consensual" sex they had become rape) when under such a significant amount of alcohol/drugs?

The Court is being asked to look at the events throughout the evening when she died. It seems that they were both very drunk. They arrived home drunk and kept on drinking and (in the context of sex) at some stage a point will be reached when consent “in law” can no longer be given through intoxication, but consent “in fact” is still / or may still be there.

But, as to the injuries, at no stage of this evening could Natalie consent “in law” to any injury from ABH onwards – just cant happen “in law”, so when Broadhurst does so, he is acting unlawfully. But “in fact” she may have been consenting to the injuries. The lack of consent “in law” is a question as to whether or not there is a defense – as she cannot provide consent “in Law”, there can not be a defense. But if “in fact” she was consenting, this can then be relevant to the sentence once guilt is established. Some question, different objectives.

If you want to discuss rape – at what point of the evening does consent “in law” fade to zero through intoxication AND did they have sex beyond that point.

Sawdust I have no idea where you have got the idea that there was 'no evidence' that Broadhurst caused her injuries, or that she died from her injuries

Go back and read what I have said, you have misquoted me.

His whole defence was that she sustained the injuries that contributed to her death, because she liked 'rough sex' and had consented to those injuries

No it wasn’t as I read the remarks. My understanding was that his defense was that he did not kill her. See para 23 onward of the sentence remarks as to the law on consent in such cases. The Judge clearly has a grip on it. BTW Bear in mind that from R v Brown, consent cannot be given to its injuries from ABH and above.

I read it as goose saying that if it were the one injury, it would be plausible as an accident as people do insert stupid things into themselves to see if it’s pleasurable (though ime that’s usually men sticking things up their arse!). However given the extent of her injuries, and that he left her there, you can see why it wasn’t a successful defence.

Sorry - is Goosefoot trying to defend the outcome of the killing of Natalie Connolly?
Every now and again there's a case that is just indefensible - and imho - this is one of them. Vile .

Cut to the chase goosefoot.

That was a lot of words, tell us what you are actually getting at regarding Natalie Connolly.

No need to pussyfoot around.

But he was convicted, which means that the verdict doesn't say that she did, or necessarily can, consent to that kind of activity. The fact that it was put forward as a an argument doesn't mean that it's what the law says. The defence is allowed to make any argument they think might work and in some cases that is going to be a shitty one, because there is no good one available.

It seems to come down in a lot of instances to figuring out just what someone can say yes to. Some things are clear one way or the other, but where they meet in the middle is less clear.

As far as things like the can though - I would not assume that something creating terrible injuries means the person didn't agree to whatever it was or that there was an intent to cause that injury. It makes sense that would be the case on the face of it, but if you've ever spent much time in an ER, people come in quite often with pretty terrible and self-inflicted sex injuries, often from things they have tried to insert inside themselves. Generally because they didn't realise what was going to happen. In a case like this one with so many injuries and someone so drunk, that doesn't seem a plausible explanation. But so far as saying no one would think something like that was a good idea, it might be more than you'd guess.

TrySleeping it is one of the most sickening examples of this oh-so-popular defence. When I think about what she went through it makes me want to weep.

The more I think about this Natalie Connelly case, the more I wonder about the fact this man is/was a multi millionaire. Has he paid someone off. I just can’t believe this!!!