ABSTRACT
Introduction Murder, a common law offence, is defined as the ‘unlawful killing of a reasonable person in being’. The mens rea of the offence is intention to kill or cause grievous bodily harm. The actus reus is reasonably straightforward. Questions have been raised in the courts regarding where a person’s life begins in the case of a foetus. The Court of Appeal also had to consider this issue in trying to tackle the very difficult moral dilemma of whether to override the parents’ strong objections to a surgical operation to separate their conjoined twins. This case cannot be viewed as a precedent given its highly extraordinary circumstances, but it is interesting that the court decided that the operation should go ahead, notwithstanding that this would immediately cause the death of the weaker twin. Their comment that she could not sustain life on her own suggests that she might not be considered a ‘person in being’ were a doctor performing the operation charged with causing her death.
