Reflections on Dudley and Stephens and Killing the Innocent: Taking a Wrong Conceptual Path

Abstract

This is a chapter of a book, Glanville Williams: The Sanctity of Life and the Criminal Law, to be published in 2013 by Cambridge University Press. In this chapter I argue that the famous "lifeboat" case of Dudley and Stephens was wrongly decided because Lord Coleridge failed to distinguish between the criminal law defense concepts of justification and excuse; and Professor Glanville Williams, in his critique of the case, also failed to focus on this important distinction.

Keywords: criminal law, homicide, justification, excuse, necessity, duress